•    •>    -     ,      \        .    •  - 

N  •    :          v 

.. .        •         V  • 


LIBRARY 


PRESENTED  BY 

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LIBRARY 


The  Best  English  Essays 


EDITED   BY 

SHERWIN  CODY 


A  SELECTION  FROM  THE  WORLD'S 
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A  SELECTION 
FROM  THE  BEST 
ENGLISH  ESSAYS 

ILLUSTRATIVE  OF  THE  HISTORY 
OF  ENGLISH  PROSE  STYLE 


CHOSEN     AND     ARRANGED     WITH 
HISTORICAL    fif  CRITICAL    INTRODUCTIONS 

By     SHERWIN      CODY 

EDITOR  or  "THE  WORLD'S  GREATEST  SHORT  STORIES,"  AND  AUTHOR 
or  "THE  ART  or  WRITING  AND  (PEAKING  THE  ENGLISH  LANGUAGE" 


CHICAGO      •      A.    C.    McCLURG 
tf     COMPANY      •      M  C  M  I  I  I 


COPYRIGHT 
BY  A.  C.  MCCLURG  &  Co. 

A.D.    1903 

PUBLISHED  MAY  23, 1903 


UNIVERSITY    PRESS    •    JOHN    WILSON 
AND    SON    •    CAMBRIDGE,  U.S.A. 


TO 
JOHN    FRANKLIN    GENUNG,   PH.D., 

Professor  of  Rhetoric  at  Amherst  College 


Contents 


PAGS 

Preface xi 

General    Introduction  —  The   English  Essay  and 
English  Prose  Style : 

I.    Historical  Review xvii 

II.    Style,  or  the  Artistic  Element  in  Prose  .  xxv 

III.   The  Possibilities  of  Prose xxxii 

I.   BACON  :  Master  of  Condensation     ....  3 

Of  Studies  (version  of  1597)       .     .     .     .  5 

Of  Studies  (version  of  1625)      ....  6 

Of  Truth 8 

Of  Friendship n 

II.   SWDT  :  the  Greatest  English  Satirist     ...  23 

A  Tale  of  a  Tub 26 

The  Bookseller's  Dedication  to  the  Right 

Honourable  John  Lord  Soraers      .     .  26 
The  Epistle  Dedicatory  to  His   Royal 

Highness  Prince  Posterity  ....  31 

Preface 38 

The   Three   Brothers   and   their   Coats 

[Sect.  II] 39 


viii  Contents 

PAGE 

III.  ADDISON  :  First  of  the  Humorists      ...  55 

Sir  Roger  De  Coverley  in  the  Country  .  5  7 

Sir  Roger  at  Home 57 

Sir  Roger  and  Will  Wimble  ....  62 

Sir  Roger  at  Church 65 

The  Man  of  the  Town 69 

The  Fan  Exercise 72 

IV.  LAMB  :  Greatest  of  the  Humorists     ...  79 

Letter  to  Coleridge 82 

A  Dissertation  upon  Roast  Pig     ...  84 

Mrs.  Battle's  Opinions  on  Whist   ...  94 

Poor  Relations 103 

V.   DE  QUINCEY  :  Inventor  of  Modern  "  Im- 
passioned Prose" 115 

The  English  Mail  Coach 118 

Sect.  I  —  The  Glory  of  Motion     .     .  120 

Going  down  with  Victory      .     .     .  126 

Sect.  II — The  Vision  of  Sudden  Death  131 
Sect.  Ill  —  Dream-Fugue  :    Founded 
on  the  Preceding  Theme  of  Sudden 

Death 154 

Levana    and    Our    Ladies    of    Sorrow 

(Suspiria  de  Profundis) 165 

VI.   CARLYLE:  the  Latter- Day  Prophet    .     .     .  177 

Characteristics 180 

VII.   EMERSON:  the  Lecturer 237 

Self- Reliance 240 


Contents  ix 

PAGE 

VIII.   MACAULAY  :  the  Rhetorician 277 

The  Puritans  (Essay  on  Milton)  .     .     .  278 
Boswell's  "  Life  of  Johnson  ".     ...  284 
The  Perfect  Historian   (Essay  on  His- 
tory)     321 

IX.    RUSKIN  :  the  Impassioned  Critic  .     .     .     .  329 

Sea-Painting  (Modern  Painters,  Vol.  I.)    .  333 
The  Virtues   of   Architecture    (Stones    of 

Venice,  Vol.  II.) 347 

The  Crown  of  Wild  Olive   (Introduction 

or  Preface) 360 

X.   MATTHEW  ARNOLD  :  the  Intellectual  Critic  3  79 

Sweetness  and  Light  (Culture  and  Anarchy)  382 


PREFACE 

A  PREFACE  is  an  invention  to  enable  an 
author  to  argue  with  his  critics  without 
disturbing  the  general  reader,  who  is 
expected  to  skip  the  preface.  The  remarks  in  this 
preface  are  addressed  to  a  very  small  number  of 
persons;  but  they  are  the  persons  whose  voices 
are  most  likely  to  be  heard,  while  the  multitude 
(if  by  any  chance  this  volume  should  have  a 
multitude)  of  common  readers  will  remain  pro- 
foundly quiet. 

I  wish  to  answer  several  questions  which  I  as 
a  critic  have  put  to  myself  as  an  editor  of  essays : 
Are  selections  a  cheap  substitute  for  complete 
works?  or  are  they  better  than  complete  works? 
or  should  they  not  be  attempted  at  all  ? 

My  answer  as  an  editor  to  that  threefold  ques- 
tion is,  that  for  the  common  reader,  whose  time 
is  limited,  the  complete  works  of  an  author  are 
almost  useless  because  of  their  bulk  and  the  time 
necessary  to  get  through  them.  As  a  result,  com- 
plete works  are  put  on  library  shelves,  there  to 
remain  unread.  Any  man  who  can  help  his  fel- 
lows to  read  more  successfully  is  a  public  bene- 


xii  Preface 

factor.  If  an  editor  can  separate  the  work  which 
the  common  reader  will  care  to  read  from  that 
which  he  will  not  care  to  read,  so  that  with  the 
limited  time  at  the  reader's  disposal  and  limited 
mental  energy  remaining  after  the  drudgery  of 
life  has  had  its  share,  some  parts  of  a  great  author 
will  actually  get  read,  that  editor  is  performing 
a  public  service  by  selection,  and  a  service  that  no 
man  can  perform  in  any  other  possible  way. 

Now  how  can  this  selection  be  made  so  that  it 
will  have  the  desired  effect  ? 

Many  competent  judges  have  asserted  that 
"  selections  are  a  snare  and  a  delusion."  I  know 
very  well  what  they  mean,  and  agree  with  them. 
They  refer  to  the  scrappy  "specimens"  of  authors' 
libraries  that  make  no  other  pretension  than  to  be 
cheap  substitutes  for  vastly  larger  collections  of 
complete  works.  It  kills  a  literary  work  to  muti- 
late it.  But  selection  of  complete  portions  even 
of  longer  works  need  not  be  mutilation. 

We  have  no  special  difficulty  in  selecting  novels, 
since  each  novel  constitutes  a  volume,  and  we  can 
buy  and  read  the  volume  we  wish.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  place  Dickens's  complete  works  along 
five  feet  of  our  library  shelves  in  order  to  get 
"  David  Copperfield."  A  short  story  or  an  essay, 
however,  cannot  conveniently  or  economically  be 
printed  in  a  separate  volume.  Yet  it  is  just  as 
separate  and  distinct  a  work  of  literary  art  as  a 
novel  is.  Each  essay  and  each  short  story  ought 
to  stand  on  its  own  feet,  and  be  judged  quite  by 


Preface 


Xlll 


itself,  just  as  each  poem  or  oration  ought  to  be 
judged.  No  greater  service  can  be  performed  for 
such  a  short  masterpiece  than  taking  it  away  from 
its  fellows  and  setting  it  by  itself.  It  is  like  re-j 
moving  a  shapely  maple  from  the  heart  of  the 
forest,  where  it  is  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  great 
pines  that  overshadow  it,  and  planting  it  beside 
the  town  pump,  where  every  passerby  may  look 
up  with  admiration  at  its  beautiful  proportions 
and  feel  gratitude  in  his  heart  for  the  friendly 
shade.  This  is  very  different  from  chopping  that 
tree  up  into  fence-posts  and  using  them  to  form 
an  ugly  barrier  around,  let  us  say,  a  moss-covered 
tombstone. 

The  only  unity  that  can  usually  be  found  con- 
necting several  essays  is  the  style  of  the  author; 
but  that'  forms  a  practical  reason  for  placing 
several  distinct  and  complete  works  of  art,  such 
as  complete  1  essays  are,  side  by  side  in  one  vol- 
ume. In  the  present  undertaking,  the  ideal  would 
be  to  print  the  work  chosen  from  each  author  in 
a  separate  volume.  Each  has  been  treated  with 
his  own  separate  introduction,  so  that  this  could 
easily  be  done  if  it  were  mechanically  desirable. 
For  the  sake  of  economy  and  convenience  to  the 

1  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  division  of  their  work  made  by 
authors  is  not  the  only  sign  of  completeness.  Macaulay's  descrip- 
tion of  the  Puritans  in  the  Essay  on  Milton  is  complete  in  itself, 
and  so  is  the  study  of  sea-painting  selected  from  Ruskin's  "  Modern 
Painters"  for  this  volume,  though  the  brief  description  of  Turner's 
"  Slave  Ship  "  at  the  end  would  be  but  a  fragment,  since  it  is  not 
intelligible  except  as  an  illustration  of  Ruskin's  argument. 


XIV 


Preface 


reader,  all  are  printed  in  one  volume,  but  in  such 
a  way  that  the  reader  is  invited  to  read  and  con- 
sider only  one  author  at  a  time  in  precisely  the 
same  way  that  he  would  if  he  had  a  set  of  ten  or 
a  dozen  little  volumes  on  his  library  shelves,  one 
of  which  he  would  take  down  and  read  to-day 
and  another  to-morrow.  Each  group  contains 
all  that  any  person  should  think  of  trying  to 
digest  at  one  time.  If  more  were  to  be  swallowed 
it  would  result  in  mental  dyspepsia. 

One  more  question  remains  for  brief  consider- 
ation. The  critic  in  me  asks  the  editor,  Why 
do  you  undertake  to  write  on  "  prose  style,"  after 
De  Quincey  and  Pater  and  all  the  ten  thousand 
others?  and  how  will  it  help  to  promote  a  public 
habit  of  reading  essays? 

I  reply  that  I  have  not  undertaken  a  discussion 
of  style  for  the  purpose  of  exploiting  any  special 
critical  or  philosophic  ideas,  but  only  for  a  purely 
practical  object.  I  believe  that  no  man  thinks  well 
unless  he  can  express  himself  well,  and  that  it  is 
the  duty  of  every  man  and  woman  of  intelligence 
and  culture  to  set  systematically  about  acquiring 
a  greater  command  of  expression  through  his 
native  language.  Self-expression  is  a  simple 
means  of  testing  one's  thoughts,  even  if  the  ex- 
pression goes  no  farther  than  one's  own  closet 
But  conversation  and  written  letters  afford  an 
invaluable  means  of  testing  one's  ideas  by  the 
ideas  of  others,  if  one  has  command  of  the  me- 
dium of  expression.  Command  of  that  medium, 


Preface 


xv 


and  the  habit  and  practice  of  using  it,  I  hold  to  be 
indispensable  to  any  adequate  culture. 

Now  essays  have  two  especial  uses :  They  give 
a  certain  intellectual  pleasure  that  is  denied  to  the 
novel  or  drama,  with  their  rapid  movement  and 
their  appeal  to  the  universal  emotions  of  the  hu- 
man heart,  and  that  is  likewise  denied  to  the  poem, 
with  its  lofty  atmosphere  and  highly  artificial 
structure,  so  far  removed  from  the  plain  level  of 
everyday  prose  (best  typified  in  the  prose  essay). 
The  other  special  use  of  the  masterpieces  of  the 
great  essayists  is  in  affording  to  every  one  models 
of  style,  or  ways  of  using  words,  exactly  suited  to 
everyday  conversation  and  business  and  social 
letter-writing.  Therefore  while  we  are  reading 
essays  for  the  intellectual  pleasure  that  they  give, 
we  ought  at  the  same  time  to  be  studying  the 
method  of  each  writer  in  using  words,  with  a 
practical  eye  to  our  own  needs  in  the  direction  of 
a  better  command  of  words.  No  one  who  would 
take  any  intellectual  pleasure  in  reading  essays 
ought  to  ignore  the  other  element  of  style.1 

"  Self-Reliance,"  by  Emerson,  is  used  by  special 
arrangement  with  and  permission  of  Houghton, 
Mififlin  &  Co.,  the  authorized  publishers  of  Emer- 
son's works. 

1  Another  reason  for  the  study  of  "  style"  in  connection  with 
essays  will  be  found  in  the  General  Introduction. 


GENERAL    INTRODUCTION 

THE   ENGLISH    ESSAY   AND    ENGLISH    PROSE 
STYLE 


HISTORICAL   REVIEW 

IT  is  interesting  to  note  the  form  impressed 
upon  nearly  every  species  of  writing  by  the 
original  mode  of  publication  —  a  form  re- 
tained in  greater  or  less  degree  long  after  the 
merely  mechanical  method  of  publication  had 
been  wholly  changed.  Thus  epic  poetry  was 
originally  the  chanted  narrative  of  the  wandering 
minstrel,  telling  of  heroic  deeds  and  strange 
adventures  more  or  less  historic.  The  lyric  poem 
was  originally  a  song  —  of  love  or  some  other 
intense  emotion  too  shy  to  show  its  undraped 
form  in  any  other  atmosphere  than  the  rosy  twi- 
light of  the  song.  The  modern  short  story  was 
first  told  by  travellers  in  taverns,  and  to  this  day 
it  is  not  uncommon  to  find  a  little  tavern  vulgarity 
hanging  about  it.  The  first  modern  novel  ( Rich- 
ardson's "Pamela")  was  a  series  of  letters. 
Dickens  and  Thackeray  were  first  published  in 
shilling  parts,  and  that  method  of  publication  so 
fixed  upon  the  modern  novel  its  characteristic 

b 


xviii  General  Introduction 

of  lengthy  formlessness  that  even  to  this  day 
the  defect  is  being  thrown  off  with  the  utmost 
difficulty. 

In  early  times,  in  Greece  for  example,  prose  had 
two  methods  of  publication,  namely,  through  the 
mouth  of  the  orator  in  places  of  political  debate, 
and  through  the  mouth  of  the  philosophic  lecturer 
in  his  academic  grove,  where  he  talked  with  his 
pupils  in  a  sort  of  conversational  monologue  (ex- 
emplified in  the  writings  of  Plato).  As  this  latter 
kind  of  prose  could  not  be  indulged  in  by  many,  it 
received  little  or  no  attention  rhetorically.  Aris- 
totle's treatise  on  rhetoric  was  devoted  wholly  to 
the  art  of  public  speaking. 

So  it  came  about  that  everything  that  was  not 
an  oration  or  a  lecture  was  expressed  only  in 
poetry.  That  narrowing  of  the  field  of  prose 
due  to  the  original  form  of  publication  has  per- 
sisted in  the  minds  of  many  even  to  this  day,  and 
scholars  and  writers  on  rhetoric  have  taken  little 
notice  of  the  new-fangled  forms  of  prose  that 
began  to  come  into  use  only  so  short  a  time  ago 
as  two  hundred  years.  Our  textbooks  on  rhetoric 
are  still  based  on  Aristotle,  and  Plato  is  held  up 
as  the  only  model  of  a  perfect  prose  style  for  all 
occasions  except  those  of  public  speaking. 

The  beginning  of  modern  English  prose  as  a 
fine  art  may  be  conveniently  dated  from  the  King 
James  translation  of  the  Bible.  It  is  a  curious 
thing  that  a  translation  should  give  us  new  forms 
of  prose  style,  and  that  we  should  so  constantly 


General  Introduction  xix 

refer  to  the  English  Bible  rather  than  simply  to 
the  Bible  as  originally  written.  The  fact  is  that 
the  most  literary  portions  of  the  Bible  were  orig- 
inally written  as  poetry ;  but  when  the  translators 
had  to  turn  this  Hebrew  poetry  into  English  they 
of  course  found  it  impossible  to  make  the  transla- 
tion take  the  form  of  English  verse,  and  were 
confronted  with  the  task  of  discovering  a  worthy 
expression  in  prose.  The  success  of  Hebrew 
poetry  in  English  prose  was  so  apparent,  and 
came  with  such  universal  force  into  the  education 
of  every  English-speaking  man  and  woman,  that 
English  prose  was  exalted  to  a  position  that  mere 
prose  never  could  have  held  in  Greece  or  Rome. 
It  would  not  be  difficult  to  trace  all  our  modern 
"  prose  poetry  "  and  "  impassioned  prose  "  to 
such  masterpieces  as  "  The  Book  of  Job,"  "  The 
Psalms,"  "  Ecclesiastes,"  "  Song  of  Solomon," 
etc. 

Even  simple  prose  found  a  new  form  in  the 
translation  of  the  New  Testament.  Christ  was 
not  a  lecturer  or  monologue  talker,  like  Socrates.1 
He  merely  "  conversed  "  with  his  disciples.  In 
the  New  Testament  for  the  first  time  we  find 
ordinary  conversation  raised  to  the  level  of  per- 
manent literature.  The  addition  to  the  possibil- 
ities of  prose  was  one  of  the  utmost  importance, 

1  The  reader  in  looking  over  the  dialogues  of  Plato  will  soon 
perceive  that  the  lay  characters  are  mere  figures  of  straw  set  up 
for  rhetorical  purposes.  Moreover,  Socrates  talked  of  philosophic 
ideas,  while  Christ  appeared  more  as  the  friend  offering  sympathy, 
consolation,  and  advice. 


xx  General  Introduction 

and  the  New  Testament  formed  the  training 
school  for  all  our  most  delightful  conversational 
essayists  from  Addison  to  Lamb. 

In  addition  to  the  oratorical  and  disquisitional 
(or  lecture)  styles  handed  down  to  us  by  the 
ancients,  and  the  prose  poetry  and  conversational 
styles  given  us  by  the  Old  and  New  Testaments, 
English  literature  had  already  received  in  embryo 
the  story-telling  style  of  the  traveller  in  the  inn 
as  it  had  been  caught  and  fixed  in  literature  by 
Boccaccio  in  the  "  Decameron."  The  "  Decam- 
eron "  was  soon  reinforced  by  the  "  Arabian 
Nights,"  which  had  come  into  existence  about  the 
same  time  as  the  "  Decameron,"  though  unknown 
to  the  English. 

We  may  now  trace  in  the  English  prose  essay 
(with  side  glances  at  English  prose  fiction)  the 
unfolding  and  development  of  these  five  elemen- 
tary prose  types. 

The  first  great  English  essayist,  Bacon,  was 
probably  not  so  much  influenced  by  the  Bible  as 
were  all  who  followed  him.  He  developed  the 
conversational  style  in  the  essay  in  an  original 
way  from  classic  models,  though  the  result  was 
for  secular  purposes  not  unlike  that  for  loftier 
purposes,  which  came  from  the  sayings  of  Christ 
recorded  in  the  Gospels.  Bacon  was  an  admir- 
able conversationist,  and  he  developed  his  powers 
in  that  line,  and  especially  as  a  wit  after  the 
Elizabethan  manner,  by  a  systematic  study  of 
"apophthegms"  (as  he  called  them).  He  stocked 


General  Introduction  xxi 

himself  with  wit  in  advance,  so  to  speak,  by  keep- 
ing voluminous  notebooks,  in  which  he  jotted 
down  every  clever  sentence  that  occurred  to  him, 
so  that  on  some  suitable  occasion  he  might  intro- 
duce it  in  conversation.  He  also  picked  up  and 
recorded  the  epigrammatic  or  witty  sayings  of 
others.  Realizing  that  some  of  these  notes  of 
his  were  excellent  of  their  kind,  he  published 
them  in  the  first  edition  of  his  "  Essays."  In 
later  editions  the  simple  notes  were  developed 
into  more  consecutive  and  perfectly  rounded 
compositions. 

Of  course  there  was  nothing  particularly  new 
in  the  mere  form  of  these  epigrammatic  and 
highly  condensed  sentences,  for  under  the  name 
"  proverbs "  and  "  epigrams "  they  had  been 
kilown  since  the  beginning  of  literature;  but  the 
accident  which  led  Bacon  to  shape  a  group  of  such 
condensed  sayings  into  a  rounded  essay  gave  a 
new  form  to  written  and  published  prose,  the 
modern  development  of  which  we  see  in  Carlyle, 
and  especially  in  Emerson. 

Perhaps  the  first  prose  writer  to  show  the  full 
effect  of  the  style  of  the  English  Old  Testament 
was  Milton.  He  caught  at  the  very  beginning 
and  turned  most  effectively  to  his  uses  that  pe- 
culiar prose  cadence  which  takes  the  place  of 
metre  in  poetry.  He  also  gave  his  writings  the 
imaginative  quality  of  the  Old  Testament  prose 
poetry.  As  Milton's  prose  was  employed  for  the 
most  part  in  controversial  literature,  however,  it 


xxii  General  Introduction 

is  as  a  poet  that  he  will  be  remembered  in  literary 
history. 

Almost  at  the  same  time  another  writer  gave 
us  a  practical  application  of  the  style  of  the  New 
Testament.  This  was  Bunyan  in  "  The  Pilgrim's 
Progress."  In  his  "  parables  "  Christ  had  made 
a  somewhat  new  application  of  the  old  "  fable." 
Bunyan's  book  was  an  enlarged  parable.  His 
style  had  all  the  simplicity  of  everyday  conver- 
sation, and  he  showed  clearly  how  a  plain  story 
told  in  so  simple  a  style  might  be  elevated  by  the 
moral  significance,  and  by  this  almost  alone,  to 
the  rank  of  the  classics. 

The  most  simple  written  expression  of  con- 
versation, however,  is  found  in  friendly  letters. 
When  paper  became  cheap  enough  so  that  letters 
could  easily  be  written,  this  style  had  a  natural 
and  spontaneous  development.  Steele  was  the 
first  to  suggest  the  idea  of  printed  letters  filled 
with  town  gossip.  His  "  Tatler,"  "  Spectator," 
and  "  Guardian  "  were  little  more  than  daily  let- 
ters in  which  the  gossip  and  conversation  of  the 
wags  and  wits  at  the  coffee-houses  were  com- 
municated to  a  much  larger  circle  of  friends. 
Addison,  who  had  been  brought  up  on  the  English 
Bible,  was  quick  to  see  the  value  of  this  method 
of  literary  composition,  and  in  the  "  Spectator  " 
he  added  to  the  mere  secular  town  gossip  of  Steele 
something  of  the  moral  style  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament. So  it  was  that  conversational  letter- 
writing  became  a  literary  form  of  the  English 


General  Introduction  xxiii 

language.  Here  was  the  beginning  of  the  essay 
in  its  most  popular  form.  Johnson  and  Gold- 
smith followed  in  the  steps  of  Steele  and  Addi- 
son;  and  finally  in  Charles  Lamb  the  humorous 
letter-like  essay  reached  its  zenith  of  perfection. 

Almost  at  the  same  time  that  Steele  and  Addi- 
son  were  giving  us  the  "  Spectator,"  another  form 
of  essay  was  added  to  English  literature  by  Swift. 

Though  Swift  seems  to  us  one  of  the  most 
unclerical  and  morally  repulsive  men  among  the 
great  writers  of  English  literature,  still  I  believe 
that  a  careful  study  of  his  work  will  show  that 
he  was  the  literary  type  par  excellence  of  the 
preacher  of  his  day.  That  was  the  day  of 
"hell-fire,  thunder-and-lightning"  sermons.  The 
preachers  got  their  cue  from  the  prophets  of  the 
Old  Testament.  As  soon  as  the  Bible  was  trans- 
lated they  seized  upon  the  denunciations  of  the 
old  Hebrew  preachers  as  furnishing  exactly  the 
literary  form  they  were  in  need  of,  and  bran- 
dished their  new-found  weapons  with  almost 
demoniac  glee.  They  were  intensely  in  earnest, 
and  were  fighting  the  devil  upon  his  own  ground. 
The  warfare  was  prodigious,  and  it  is  not  strange 
that  the  amenities  of  peace  were  often  brushed 
ruthlessly  aside.  As  General  Sherman  said, 
"  War  is  hell  "  —  war  upon  the  devil  as  well  as 
human  combat.  In  this  ferocious  moral  attack 
upon  the  sins  of  the  world  Dean  Swift  was  easily 
the  greatest  giant  of  them  all.  Morose  and  ill- 
natured  as  he  was,  he  meant  well,  even  in  his 


xxiv  General  Introduction 

"  Modest  Proposal "  for  eating  children.  His 
satirical  arrows  never  missed,  and  they  were  shot 
with  almost  superhuman  strength.  If  the  devil 
was  at  that  time  leading  his  forces  in  person,  how 
he  must  have  wished  that  the  great  Dean  were 
upon  his  side! 

We  may  see  the  influence  of  Swift  in  Carlyle, 
and  also  in  the  later  work  of  Ruskin  ("  Fors 
Clavigera").  But  in  his  field  of  devilish  satire, 
Swift  stands  supreme  in  English  literature,  and 
perhaps  in  any  literature. 

The  letter-writing  style  as  used  by  Richardson 
in  "  Pamela  "  and  "  Clarissa  Harlowe  "  became 
incorporated  in  the  English  novel ;  and  in  Thack- 
eray we  see  the  good-humored  and  humorous 
preaching  of  Addison  perfectly  assimilated  and 
adapted  to  the  requirements  of  the  novelist.  In- 
deed in  recalling  Bunyan,  Swift  (in  "Gulliver"), 
Goldsmith,  and  Thackeray,  we  realize  what  a  debt 
the  novel  owes  to  the  essay. 

One  more  element  remains  to  be  considered, 
and  that  is  the  lyrical  form  and  use  of  prose.  De 
Quincey  in  his  "  Confessions  of  an  English 
Opium-Eater,"  and  even  more  in  "  The  English 
Mail  Coach "  and  "  Suspiria  de  Profundis " 
(which  were  in  the  nature  of  a  sequel  to  the  "Con- 
fessions"), was  the  first  to  show  the  peculiar 
lyrical  powers  of  prose  in  modern  essay  writing, 
though  in  "  Ecclesiastes  "  and  other  parts  of  the 
Old  Testament  we  have  as  thorough-going  "prose 
poetry  "  as  ever  De  Quincey  gave  us.  But  De 


General  Introduction  xxv 

Quincey  was  far  outdone  in  this  field  by  one  who 
followed  him,  namely,  Ruskin,  in  whose  hands 
lyrical  prose  has  reached  its  extreme  development. 
In  the  novel,  too,  it  was  immensely  exploited  by 
Dickens. 

The  latest  development  of  the  English  prose 
essay  is  a  return  to  the  Greek  of  Plato,  and  no 
better  representative  of  this  rejuvenescence  of  the 
classic  spirit  could  be  found  than  Matthew  Ar- 
nold. But  these  Hellenic  moderns  have  also  been 
largely  influenced  by  the  French  style  of  such  men 
as  Sainte-Beuve,  Flaubert,  and  Daudet,  to  men- 
tion three  out  of  a  multitude. 

In  the  following  section  we  shall  endeavor  to 
see  what  prose  style  may  be  in  view  of  all  that  has 
gone  before. 

II 

STYLE,    OR    THE   ARTISTIC    ELEMENT   IN    PROSE 

BEFORE  proceeding  with  a  general  considera- 
tion of  prose  style,  let  us  pause  to  note  an  ob- 
jection that  the  reader  may  possibly  raise  at 
this  point.  Why,  he  will  ask,  should  you  give 
so  much  space  to  "  style "  in  introducing  the 
"  Best  English  Essays  "  ?  Is  not  the  matter  of 
far  more  importance  in  a  literary  composition 
than  the  manner?  1 

1  De  Quincey  says  of  England :  "  In  no  country  upon  earth, 
were  it  possible  to  carry  such  an  axiom  into  practical  effect,  is  it 


xx vi  General  Introduction 

Yes,  matter  is  always  supreme  over  manner  as 
far  as  greatness  in  literature  is  concerned;  but 
it  happens  that  in  the  essay  especially,  "  the  style 
is  the  man."  As  De  Quincey,  quoting  from 
Wordsworth,  expresses  it,  style  is  not  the  dress 
of  thought,  but  the  incarnation.  Though  the  soul 
of  a  beautiful  woman  is  infinitely  above  her  body, 
we  creatures  of  sense  would  entirely  lose  the  soul 
were  we  to  take  away  the  body.  Hence  we  must 
study  the  body  if  we  would  discover  the  soul. 

The  mission  of  the  prose  essay  is  much  like  the 
mission  of  woman's  beauty  —  it  is  to  diffuse  an 
atmosphere  and  give  us  pleasure  in  such  varied 
and  minute  ways  that  we  are  at  a  loss  to  analyze 
or  assign  a  reason.  In  short,  an  essay  should  be 
criticised  as  a  work  of  art,  not  as  a  collection  of 
moral  or  scientific  truths ;  and  in  so  far  as  prose 
ceases  to  be  a  simple  vehicle  for  facts  and  state- 
ments of  truth,  and  comes  to  depend  for  its  suc- 
cess on  the  feeling  of  pleasure  it  produces  or  the 
sense  of  beauty  it  conveys,  it  is  said  to  possess 
"  style." 

We  understand  perfectly  how  painting  as  a  fine 
art  differs  from  house  painting  or  sign  painting, 
and  how  sculpture  differs  from  stone-hewing. 
We  also  understand  how  poetry  is  a  fine  art  akin 
both  to  music  and  to  painting,  and  even  how  the 
magic  of  oratorical  eloquence  ranks  spoken  prose 

a  more  determinate  tendency  of  the  national  mind  to  value  the 
matter  of  a  book  not  only  as  paramount  to  the  manner,  but  even 
as  distinct  from  it  and  as  capable  of  a  distinct  insulation." 


General  Introduction  xxvii 

at  times  with  the  other  arts.  But  we  find  it  very 
difficult  to  distinguish  between  prose  the  common 
drudge  of  everyday  life,  and  that  development  of 
prose  which  makes  it  a  fine  art.  For  want  of  a 
better  term,  the  word  "  style  "  has  been  coming 
into  use  to  designate  and  characterize  that  prose 
which  is  an  art.  Both  the  words  "  prose  "  and 
"  style  "  are  unfortunate  in  this  connection,  for 
the  reason  that  both  have  other  uses  and  meanT 
ings.  We  speak  of  that  which  is  dull  as  "  prosy," 
and  in  the  common  usage  "  style  "  refers  espe- 
cially to  fashions  in  dress,  and  next  to  that  to  the 
mere  manner  of  doing  a  thing,  as  when  we  say, 
"  That 's  his  style."  It  is  a  serious  misfortune 
that  when  we  speak  of  "  prose  "  we  must  think 
inevitably  of  that  which  is  dull  and  commonplace, 
and  when  we  speak  of  style  that  we  must  think 
of  the  "  styles  "  that  are  put  on  and  put  off,  or  of 
idiosyncrasy  of  manner,  of  which  no  man  has 
a  right  to  boast. 

In  studying  the  essay  from  the  point  of  view 
of  style,  we  mean  simply  that  we  are  studying 
it  as  a  work  of  fine  art,  but  with  one  limitation, 
and  that  is,  that  while  art  usually  takes  into  view 
conception  and  structure  as  well  as  execution  or 
texture,  style  applies  only  to  artistic  texture.  The 
truth  is,  the  essay  does  not  have  artistic  structure 
in  the  sense  that  the  short  story  or  the  novel  or 
the  oration  or  the  poem  does,  but  only  literary 
artistic  texture,  or  style.  (On  this  latter  point 
we  have  only  to  recall  the  discursive  and  digres- 


xxviii  General  Introduction 

sive  manner  of  all  the  great  essayists,  from 
Addison  to  De  Quincey.) 

But  even  when  we  do  catch  the  meaning  of 
style  as  referring  to  artistic  texture  of  language, 
we  seem  to  misconceive  it,  as  when  we  speak  of 
wishing  to  acquire  "a  style,"  or  to  master  "style," 
as  if  there  were  but  one  style.  This  error  is  en- 
forced apparently  by  one  master  of  style,  namely, 
Flaubert,  of  whom  one  of  his  critics  says :  "  Pos- 
sessed of  an  absolute  belief  that  there  exists  but 
one  way  to  express  one  thing,  one  word  to  call 
it  by,  one  adjective  to  qualify,  one  verb  to  animate 
it,  he  gave  himself  to  superhuman  labor  for  the 
discovery,  in  every  phrase,  of  that  word,  that 
verb,  that  epithet.  In  this  way,  he  believed  in 
some  mysterious  harmony  of  expression,  and 
when  a  true  word  seemed  to  him  to  lack  euphony, 
still  went  on  seeking  another,  with  invincible 
patience,  certain  that  he  had  not  yet  got  hold  of 
the  unique  word."  * 

Only  in  a  very  narrow  sense  was  Flaubert 
right.  The  truth  is,  there  is  an  infinite  number 
of  ways  of  expressing  any  and  every  conception 
—  in  short,  as  many  different  ways  as  there  are 
persons  to  express  it.  Laboring  under  the  false 
impression  that  there  is  but  one  style,  or,  at  any 
rate,  but  one  style  for  any  given  person,  the  stu- 
dent in  search  of  style  will  select  some  one  master 
whom  he  looks  on  as  "  a  master  of  style  "  —  to- 
day it  is  most  likely  to  be  Pater  or  Flaubert  or 

1  Quoted  by  Pater  in  his  essay  on  "  Style." 


General  Introduction  xxix 

Matthew  Arnold  —  and  will  confine  himself  to 
expressing  himself  as  his  master  does. 

In  this  volume  the  editor  offers  ten  masters  of 
style,  each  an  acknowledged  artist  in  his  way, 
each,  as  a  rule,  utterly  different  from  every  other. 
Many  of  these  writers  commanded  more  than  one 
style ;  but  we  see  each  only  in  that  style  in  which 
he  was  supreme,  the  style  which  was  especially 
characteristic  of  him.  To  the  general  reader  these 
ten  different  types  will  be  exceedingly  useful  as 
standards  for  comparison,  and  will  make  his  criti- 
cism and  judgment  of  any  style  in  future  more 
definite  and  assured;  for  not  only  ought  we  to 
enjoy  works  of  art  intuitively  and  instinctively, 
but  critically.  It  is  only  by  the  introduction  of 
the  critical  standard  that  we  can  hope  to  minimize 
merely  personal  preference  and  make  possible  the 
quick  recognition  of  any  worthy  work  of  literary 
art  that  may  come  along  in  current  literature. 

For  the  student  of  literary  style  who  wishes 
himself  to  write,  these  ten  types  will  represent  ten 
different  ways  in  which  any  particular  thought 
may  possibly  be  expressed.  Without  question, 
Flaubert  was  right  in  saying  that  there  is  one  way 
better  than  all  others  for  expressing  any  given 
conception.  Each  class  of  ideas  has  its  best  lit- 
erary form,  and  if  we  read  these  ten  groups  of 
essays  through,  we  shall  see  at  once  that  each 
type  is  so  successful,  so  truly  masterful,  because 
it  is  the  one  type  best  suited  to  the  particular 
class  of  ideas  with  which  the  writer  deals.  If 


xxx  General  Introduction 

one  is  going  to  write  only  of  one  particular  class 
of  ideas,  one  will  need  only  one  type  of  style; 
but  as  no  other  writer  will  be  precisely  like 
Addison  or  Ruskin  or  Matthew  Arnold,  and  may 
have  ideas  that  would  have  delighted  Bacon  or 
Carlyle  or  De  Quincey,  and  may  even  have  ideas 
representing  all  ten  of  our  typical  writers  which 
he  will  wish  to  express  in  ten  consecutive  sen- 
tences, or  even  in  ten  consecutive  phrases,  or  ten 
consecutive  words,  so  he  will  need  all  ten  styles 
to  express  those  ten  ideas  in  the  only  perfect  way. 

But  suppose  one  fancies  that  one's  ideas  are 
most  appropriately  expressed  in  the  style  of  De 
Quincey's  impassioned  prose  or  in  Macaulay's 
rhetoric,  and  so  confines  his  study  to  those  two 
masters ;  what  will  be  the  fatal  result  ?  Why,  he 
will  elongate  his  mind  in  one  direction  until  he 
becomes  a  monstrosity,  and  his  style  will  be  a 
mere  literary  curiosity.  Nothing  is  more  dan- 
gerous than  the  imitation  of  one  writer,  nothing 
more  safe  than  the  imitation  of  many. 

We  have  spoken  of  those  who  wish  to  read  with 
critical  intelligence,  and  those  who  wish  to  write 
with  artistic  skill,  as  if  they  were  separate  and 
distinct  classes.  In  a  small  degree  they  are;  but 
for  the  most  part  they  are  one  and  the  same. 
Every  intelligent  person  ought  to  read  literature 
with  a  well-developed  critical  taste:  nearly  every 
one  will  admit  that ;  but  many  will  say  that  only 
the  few  who  are  to  become  professional  writers 
will  wish  to  spend  any  time  in  acquiring  personal 


General  Introduction  xxxi 

and  actual  skill.  This  is  an  error,  however ;  every 
person  who  will  have  any  desire  to  read  with 
critical  intelligence  will  have  occasion  to  employ 
artistic  expression  in  two  common  ways,  namely, 
in  conversation  and  in  letter-writing.  In  our 
historical  review  we  have  noticed  how  several  of 
the  essay  styles  originated  in  conversation  and  in 
letter-writing.  Conversely,  the  masterly  essays 
that  resulted  from  these  sources  will  be  the  best 
models  for  successful  conversation  and  successful 
letter-writing,  and  therefore  should  be  studied 
imitatively  as  well  as  critically.  Nay,  more,  the 
critical  perception  works  most  quickly  and  cer- 
tainly when  the  imitative  faculty  is  called  into 
activity.  In  other  words,  the  quickest  and  surest 
way  to  master  Lamb's  style  critically  is  to  try  to 
write  like  Lamb  yourself,  and  to  keep  at  your 
imitative  efforts  till  you  acquire  some  sort  of 
skill. 

In  conclusion,  I  may  say  that  there  is  nothing 
magical  about  the  choice  of  ten  types  here  pre- 
sented. Possibly  ten  other  types  equally  good 
might  have  been  found,  at  least  if  oratory  and 
fiction  could  have  been  laid  under  contribution. 
In  oratory  and  fiction,  however,  we  come  upon 
argumentative  and  dramatic  structure,  which  is 
quite  a  different  thing  from  style,  and  might 
conceivably  interfere  seriously  with  the  study  of 
it.  The  essay,  like  conversation  and  letters,  has 
no  structure.  It  is,  as  has  previously  been  said, 
a  pure  representative  of  style  as  artistic  literary 


xxxii  General  Introduction 

texture,  and  so  for  the  ordinary  student  the  essay 
furnishes  the  simplest  and  most  natural  models 
of  style. 

Nor  is  there  anything  magical  in  the  historical 
system  and  analytic  arrangement  here  offered 
merely  for  their  practical  utility  to  the  student. 
Every  great  writer  is  a  type  in  himself.  His  style 
is  sui  generis,  and  his  roots  run  out  in  a  thousand 
directions.  But  in  studying  an  author,  we  shall 
gain  most  for  ourselves  by  limiting  our  examina- 
tion to  one  point  of  view ;  and  our  study  of  differ- 
ent types  of  style  must  have  a  sharp  limit.  The 
chief  thing  is  that  the  types  we  select  should  be 
as  different  as  possible.  When  we  have  gotten 
clearly  no  more  than  three  different  views  of  the 
possibilities  of  prose  style,  we  are  pretty  well  pre- 
pared to  go  on  and  differentiate  thereafter  for 
ourselves. 

Ill 

THE    POSSIBILITIES    OF    PROSE 

IF  I  should  say  that  I  believe  that  in  the  next 
century  prose  will  supersede  verse  in  all  forms  of 
creative  writing  except  songs  that  may  be  set  to 
music,  or  purely  lyrical  poetry,  some  might  con- 
sider me  a  wild  prophet.  More  unprejudiced 
observers  would  probably  agree  with  me.  Not 
a  few  critics  have  intimated  that  Wordsworth 
would  have  done  better  to  have  chosen  the  prose 


General  Introduction  xxxiii 

form  for  most  of  his  compositions.  Though  if 
Browning  had  written  prose  it  would  possibly 
have  been  what  might  be  dubbed  "  Meredithian," 
probably  few  will  not  admit  that  George  Meredith 
was  wise  in  devoting  himself  as  largely  as  he  did 
to  the  prose  form  of  composition.  I  have  always 
thought  that  if  Byron  had  written  his  descriptive 
poems  in  prose  they  would  be  more  widely  read 
to-day  than  they  are.  It  is  also  interesting  to  note 
that  Byron  has  been  especially  popular  on  the 
continent  of  Europe,  where,  presumably,  his  work 
is  best  known  in  prose  translations  similar  to  our 
prose  translations  of  the  poetry  of  the  Bible.  We 
have  one  prose  writer,  namely,  Ruskin,  who  by 
the  admission  of  all  his  critics  has  very  distinctly 
the  characteristics  of  a  poet.  Shelley  or  Keats 
was  not  more  passionate  and  unrestrained  in  en- 
thusiasm than  Ruskin.  Yet  Ruskin  wrote  prose. 
To  be  sure,  Mr.  W.  C.  Brownell  tells  us  Ruskin 
is  a  sorry  case,  that  his  style  lacks  form  and  his 
matter  lacks  substance;  that  he  was  entirely  out 
of  his  sphere  in  writing  art  criticisms;  and  that 
in  the  days  when  nothing  but  literary  asbestos 
survives  the  fires  of  Time,  there  will  be  exceed- 
ingly little  of  Ruskin  remaining.  Mr.  Brownell 
implies  that  Ruskin' s  mistake  was  in  not  writing 
in  verse,  a  literary  form  that  might  have  saved 
him  by  imposing  on  him  some  restraint.  He 
points  out  lack  of  restraint  as  the  vital  defect 
of  all  so-called  "  prose  poetry."  Prose,  he  says, 
ought  to  be  sane,  and  he  seems  to  think  that  it  is 


xxxiv  General  Introduction 

quite  impossible  that  it  should  be  sane  unless  it 
restricts  itself  to  scrupulous  exactness  of  phrase. 
The  salvation  of  poetry  is  in  the  restriction  im- 
posed by  its  form  when  the  author  completely 
abandons  himself  to  his  emotion. 

Now  the  case  of  Ruskin  is  interesting  for  the 
reason  that  in  Ruskin' s  early  writings  we  find  the 
extreme  development  of  lyrical  prose.  If  we  ad- 
mit that  Ruskin  succeeded  in  his  "  prose  poetry," 
it  will  be  hard  to  point  out  anything  which  prose 
cannot  do. 

Some  have  hinted  that  Ruskin  learned  his 
method  of  using  prose  from  Hooker.  Though 
he  may  have  got  from  Hooker  the  hint  that 
started  him  in  this  direction,  Ruskin  learned  his 
art  from  the  Bible.  His  writings  contain  no  more 
passionate  prose  poetry  than  we  may  read  in 
"  Ecclesiastes,"  for  example.  Old  Testament 
prose  poetry  has  been  passed  over  because  it  was 
originally  poetry  pure  and  simple,  and  we  may 
suppose  that  the  translators  would  have  given  it 
the  verse  form  in  English  had  they  been  able. 
But  could  they  have  done  any  better  than  they 
did  do?  Evidently  Ruskin  thought  they  couldn't. 
He  was  brought  up  on  the  Bible.  His  biographer, 
Frederic  Harrison,  cites  one  short  passage  con- 
taining sixty  allusions  to  the  Bible.  In  studying 
Ruskin' s  prose  we  are  inevitably  driven  back  to 
his  model,  the  Bible. 

Now  the  interesting  thing  about  the  Bible  is 
that  its  prose  (if  not  its  original  poetry)  was  the 


General  Introduction  xxxv 

work  of  aged  scholars,  in  whom  the  unrestrained 
and  fierce  ardors  of  the  young  Ruskin,  when  he 
wrote  "Modern  Painters"  (twenty-four),  were 
wholly  lacking.  They  chose  the  words  they  did 
in  much  the  same  way  that  Flaubert  chose  his 
words,  because  they  were  eminently  suitable, 
better  than  any  other  words  they  could  find  after 
exhaustive  search,  and  words  on  which  a  body  of 
men  agreed.  So  far  as  my  reading  extends,  no 
one  has  ever  criticised  the  prose  poetry  of  the 
Bible,  not  even  Mr.  Brownell. 

We  need  not  press  this  matter  of  the  lyrical 
any  farther.  It  is  but  a  small  matter  even  in 
poetry.  We  could  sacrifice  it  entirely  and  still 
say  that  if  "  Paradise  Lost,"  "  The  Excursion," 
"  Childe  Harold  "  or  "  Don  Juan,"  or  "  The  Ring 
and  the  Book  "  were  to  be  written  to-day,  they 
would  probably  be  written  in  prose.  Such  is  the 
change  in  public  sentiment  that  has  come  about  in 
fifty  years!  The  public  seems  to  have  lost  the 
art  of  reading  verse,  and  if  the  great  narrative 
poems  of  the  past  are  to  be  saved,  they  must  be 
translated  into  prose.  Apparently  the  public  has 
waked  up  to  the  fact  that  prose  is  just  as  capable 
of  expressing  high  thoughts,  and  that  it  is  infi- 
nitely easier  to  read.  While  Ruskin's  contem- 
porary verse-poets  are  being  read  less  and  less 
every  year,  till  we  can  fancy  that  at  last  only  their 
short  lyrics  will  survive,  Ruskin,  the  prose  poet, 
not  only  got  himself  extensively  read  in  his  own 
day,  but  continues  to  be  read  side  by  side  with 


xxxvi  General  Introduction 

the  popular  novelists,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  he 
had  all  the  faults  of  those  verse-poet  contempo- 
raries. The  fact  is,  the  public  no  longer  reads 
verse  poetry,  and  it  is  not  easy  to  conceive  that 
any  poet  could  by  any  possibility  arise  who  could 
repeat  the  great  popular  successes  of  Scott's, 
Byron's,  or  Moore's  long  poems. 

Let  us  leave  argument  and  turn  to  the  practical 
side  of  the  question. 

We  are  confronted  with  the  fact  that  everybody 
writes  prose,  and  it  is  hard  to  see  any  sharp  line 
of  demarcation  between  the  prose  we  find  in  news- 
papers, let  us  say,  and  that  which  we  might  find 
in  a  prose  poem.  Everybody  writes  prose,  and  if 
everybody  were  allowed  to  wander  into  the  fields 
in  which  Mr.  Ruskin  has  operated,  we  should 
probably  find  ourselves  in  Bedlam.  Even  to 
recommend  the  study  and  cultivation  of  this  ex- 
treme sort  of  prose  might  seem  opening  the  door 
to  morbidity,  to  all  that  lack  of  sanity  to  which 
Mr.  Brownell  so  justly  objects.  There  is  no 
question  that  Ruskin's  imitators  have  made  most 
wretched  work  of  it.  Nothing  could  be  more 
nauseating  than  their  so-called  "  prose  poetry," 
whereas  the  minor  poet  is  eminently  harmless. 

The  fact  is,  while  any  one  can  write  prose,  the 
complete  mastery  of  it  is  so  difficult  that  it  is 
wholly  beyond  the  powers  of  any  one  man,  unless 
he  were  to  have  the  mental  capacity  of  a  Shake- 
speare. The  range  of  language  as  an  art  is  infi- 
nitely beyond  that  of  any  other  art  medium.  It  is 


General  Introduction  xxxvii 

the  only  art  that  can  be  said  to  be  strictly  universal. 
For  example,  painting  as  an  art  ranges  from  house 
painting  to  the  painting  of  an  "  Angelus."  Even 
house  painting  belongs  to  the  art,  for  in  the  choice 
of  colors,  the  laying  on  of  the  paint,  etc.,  there  is 
ample  room  for  skill  and  taste.  So  in  the  art  of 
using  words,  we  range  from  common  conversa- 
tion and  letter-writing  to  the  prose  poetry  of  the 
Bible.  The  difference  is,  that  whereas  not  one 
man  in  a  thousand  is  even  a  house  painter,  only 
a  small  per  cent  of  the  entire  population  do  not 
have  occasion  to  engage  in  entertaining  conver- 
sation or  effective  letter-writing.  Even  though 
the  number  of  those  that  sing  and  play  the  piano 
is  large,  it  is  trifling  beside  the  number  of  word- 
artists.  And  as  the  number  of  word-artists  is 
relatively  so  vast  at  the  bottom,  at  the  top  it  is 
correspondingly  small.  No  painter,  no  musician, 
stands  pre-eminently  alone  in  his  art  as  Shake- 
speare does  in  his :  and  great  as  Shakespeare 
was,  we  can  see  how  even  he  might  have  done 
better. 

Xow  what  shall  be  the  criterion  of  success  that 
can  be  stated  universally  for  all  the  possible  prac- 
titioners of  the  art  of  language?  Why,  simply 
this :  he  who  conveys  his  meaning  in  words  is 
successful.  If  our  word-artist  has  but  a  single 
idea,  and  can  express  it  in  a  single  word,  he  may 
not  be  great,  but  he  is  successful.  So  far  as  he 
goes  he  is  perfect.  Shakespeare  himself  could 
do  no  better.  The  ideal  of  literary  art,  then,  is 


xxxviii  General  Introduction 

simply,  wholly,  to  convey  meaning,  and  the  more 
simply  it  can  be  done  the  better.  If  three  thou- 
sand words  will  convey  one's  meaning,  three 
thousand  words  completely  mastered  and  effec- 
tively used  will  be  sufficient  for  entire  success. 
In  this  sense  complete  success  as  a  literary  artist 
is  quite  within  the  range  of  every  one,  and  it 
would  be  hard  to  find  an  excuse  for  lack  of  such 
success. 

But  now  we  come  to  those  who  have,  or  think 
they  have,  something  special  to  say,  and  to  those 
ambitious  aspirants  who  wish  to  make  writing  a 
passport  to  fame  or  money.  Let  us  dispose  of 
the  latter  first.  There  is  undoubtedly  a  field  for 
the  professional  writer  in  journalism  and  the  com- 
pilation of  books.  But  there  is  a  potentially  large 
class  of  persons  who  think :  "  Now  I  have  n't  any- 
thing in  particular  to  say,  and  I  see  no  special  use 
that  my  writings  will  have  after  I  produce  them. 
But  my  friends  Mary  Jones  and  John  Jenks 
have  made  fortunes  out  of  books,  and  I  can't  see 
that  they  have  any  more  ideas  than  I  have.  Why 
should  n't  I  enter  the  lists  and  do  as  well  as  any 
of  them?  "  It  was  this  class  which  De  Ouincey 
had  in  mind  when  he  wrote :  "  Authors  have 
always  been  a  dangerous  class  for  any  lan- 
guage. Amongst  the  myriads  who  are  prompted 
to  authorship  by  the  coarse  love  of  reputation, 
or  by  the  nobler  craving  for  sympathy,  there  will 
always  be  thousands  seeking  distinction  through 
novelties  of  diction.  Hopeless  of  any  audience 


General  Introduction  xxxix 

through  any  weight  of  matter,  they  will  turn  for 
their  last  resource  to  such  tricks  of  innovation 
as  they  can  bring  to  bear  upon  language.  What 
care  they  for  purity  or  simplicity  of  diction,  if  at 
any  cost  of  either  they  can  win  special  attention 
to  themselves?"  To  argue  with  writers  of  this 
class  or  about  them  is  useless.  All  we  can  do  is 
to  try  to  raise  the  popular  standard  and  instruct 
the  popular  taste  so  that  their  false  efforts  will 
find  no  encouragement  at  all,  and  they  will  be 
forced  by  sheer  starvation  to  turn  to  the  more 
useful  duties  of  housekeeping  or  road-making 
or  boot-blacking  —  all  eminently  useful  employ- 
ments, for  which  possibly  they  may  be  fitted. 

Now  let  us  consider  for  a  moment  that  other 
class,  which  is  no  doubt  relatively  very  large; 
the  class  of  those  who  have  ideas  which  they 
would  express,  which  it  is  essential  to  their  health 
and  happiness  that  they  should  express,  whether 
in  conversation,  letters,  or  the  printed  page  —  in 
short,  the  "  mute  inglorious  Miltons  "  of  Gray's 
Elegy.  To  these,  expression  is  a  sort  of  necessity, 
and  we  cannot  but  believe  that  all  honest,  sincere 
expression  will  also  prove  useful  somewhere,  to 
somebody  beside  the  expresser.  To  these  the 
inherited  stock  of  common -words  and  everyday 
methods  of  using  them  are  insufficient.  The  ideas 
do  not  get  through  the  words  which  would  convey 
them. 

This  is  the  point  at  which  prose  begins  to  be 
a  fine  art.  The  power  of  words  as  mechanical 


xl  General  Introduction 

symbols  for  ideas  is  exhausted.  We  must  con- 
sider new  ways  of  using  these  words.  The  most 
obvious  first  step  is  comparison,  and  we  have 
figures  of  speech.  We  find  the  field  we  have  en- 
tered a  very  large  one,  and  proceed  from  simple 
direct  comparison  in  the  simile,  through  the 
metaphor  or  implied  comparison,  to  antithetic 
comparison  and  contrast.  We  discover  that 
words  are  suggestive,  and  proceed  to  make  large 
use  of  what  Mr.  Barrett  Wendell  would  call 
"  connotation." 

But  shortly  we  stumble  upon  a  new  difficulty. 
If  we  are  going  to  use  expression  for  anything 
more  than  self-relief,  we  must  have  an  interested 
audience  or  a  body  of  readers.  The  average  man 
quickly  tires  of  listening.  We  must  work  a  charm 
upon  him  and  hold  him,  or  all  our  expression  goes 
for  naught,  and  proves  practically  to  be  no  ex- 
pression at  all.  We  are  face  to  face  with  the 
problem  of  "  economy  of  attention,"  so  well  dis- 
cussed by  Herbert  Spencer  in  his  "  Essay  on 
Style." 

We  may  hold  the  attention  of  our  hearer  or 
reader  in  two  ways,  —  one  negatively,  by  not  giv- 
ing him  any  more  of  one  thing  than  his  mind  will 
absorb  without  weariness ;  the  other  by  the  posi- 
tive charm  of  harmonious  vibration,  that  univer- 
sal principle  of  life  showing  itself  in  the  soothing 
effect  of  the  monotonous  breaking  of  waves  on 
the  seashore  and  also  in  the  positive  charm  of 
music.  If  we  are  to  make  progress,  we*  must  see 


General  Introduction  xli 

to  it  that  our  language  has  variety,  so  as  not  to 
weary,  and  music,  so  as  actually  to  charm. 

Verse  gets  its  musical  quality  in  part  by  the 
beat  of  successive  feet  in  the  metre,  and  by  the 
measured  recurrence  of  rhymes,  caesuras,  etc. 
But  prose  substitutes  a  much  freer  wave  form, 
namely,  cadence.  Ruskin  was  a  master  of  ca- 
dence. Says  Mr.  Brownell,  "  The  cadence  of 
Gibbon,  of  De  Quincey,  even  of  Jeremy  Taylor, 
is  a  simple  affair  beside  Ruskin's,  which,  in  com- 
parison, possesses  an  infinite  variety  of  notes  and 
chords."  Cadence  is  wholly  a  matter  of  the  ear. 
\Yithout  an  ear  for  fine  harmony  it  inevitably 
runs  into  disagreeable  sing-song,  or  fails  alto- 
gether. The  prose  writer  uses  it  so  long  as  it 
serves  its  purpose,  and  the  moment  he  does  not 
need  it,  he  drops  it.  The  unfortunate  thing  about 
verse  is  that  the  regular  beat  stays  by  a  man 
whether  he  wants  it  or  not,  and  if  it  does  not  come 
naturally  on  suggestion  of  his  ear,  he  feels  obliged 
to  force  it  even  when  the  result  is  totally  destruc- 
tive of  harmony.  Ruskin  in  his  use  of  cadence 
has  precisely  the  same  fault,  for  it  becomes  a  man- 
nerism with  him,  and  finally  wearies  the  reader 
past  all  endurance.  This  excess  we  realize  as  a 
fault  in  Ruskin.  It  is  equally  an  inherent  fault 
in  all  verse  forms. 

And  now  we  may  consider  the  element  of  re- 
straint. Verse  affords  mechanical  restraint  in 
that  it  requires  a  prodigious  effort  to  express  a 
high  and  noble  idea  effectively  in  words  which 


xlii  General  Introduction 

will  serve  the  mechanical  requirements  of  metre, 
rhyme,  etc.,  to  say  nothing  of  poetic  dignity  and 
the  iron  laws  of  the  custom  of  the  ages.  The 
writer  has  to  weigh  well  every  syllable,  and  the 
continued  and  repeated  polishing  that  is  forced 
upon  him  goes  a  long  way  to  take  the  insanity  out 
of  his  emotional  expression.  Prose  has  no  such 
mechanical  restraints,  and  hence  some  critics 
would  have  us  believe  that  it  is  not  so  well  suited 
to  the  sane  expression  of  passionate  ideas.  In 
other  words,  their  cry  is,  "  Tie  the  maniacs  down 
with  straps !  " 

The  penalty  that  the  prose  writer  suffers  when 
he  fails  in  his  self-restraint  is  merely  ineffective- 
ness. He  is  like  a  free  man  working  freely  in  a 
free  country,  as  compared  with  the  poet,  who  is 
more  or  less  confined  and  liable  to  a  lashing  from 
his  master's  whip  if  he  goes  wrong.  Or  to  drop 
the  figure,  poetry  offers  the  advantage  of  a  me- 
chanical restraint,  while  prose  must  depend  upon 
the  writer's  own  restraint  of  his  feelings  by  his 
free-will.  Self-mastery  is  an  indispensable  pre- 
requisite to  writing  passionate  prose.  The  case 
of  the  poet  is  precisely  the  opposite,  and  being  a 
lunatic  is  no  special  bar  to  the  writing  of  poetry. 

It  will  not  be  difficult  to  discover  that  writing 
the  highest  forms  of  prose  is  exceedingly  more 
difficult  than  writing  poetry  of  a  corresponding 
grade.  Poor  prose  is  far  more  quickly  detected 
by  the  average  man  than  poor  poetry.  Matthew 
Arnold  has  somewhere  suggested  that  good 


General  Introduction  xliii 

poetry  can  be  produced  only  by  a  more  or  less 
barbarous  age.1  It  is  the  natural  exalted  lan- 
guage of  all  rude  peoples.  As  civilization  ad- 
vances, its  power  seems  to  be  refined  away.  Some 
have  suspected  that  the  race  deteriorates  as  it 
becomes  more  civilized,  simply  for  the  reason  that 
it  can  no  longer  produce  the  poetry  of  its  infancy. 
A  better  view  is  to  believe  that  as  a  man  in 
his  civil  relations  advances  from  a  condition  of 
slavery  to  one  of  freedom  and  liberty,  where  his 
own  moral  sense  becomes  his  real  master,  the 
controlling  force  of  his  life,  so  literature  advances 
from  the  period  when  poetry  flourishes  above  prose 
because  the  self-restraint  and  self-mastery  of  the 
writer  cannot  be  depended  upon  and  mechanical 
restraint  is  necessarily  employed,  to  the  nobler 
freedom  of  prose  developed  as  a  fine  art  and 
depending  for  its  effect  and  usefulness  upon  the 
self-mastery  and  artistic  mastery  of  the  writer; 
in  other  words,  upon  his  eminent  sanity  fitting 
him  for  the  just  exercise  of  the  unlimited  powers 
of  prose. 

1  It  is  also  to  be  observed  that  poetry  is  most  often  written 
successfully  by  young  men  {Keats,  Shelley,  Byron),  while  prose  is 
seldom  written  successfully  till  age  and  experience  have  ripened 
the  mind  (vide  Thackeray,  Lamb,  George  Eliot,  and  many 
others). 


I 

BACON 


A  SELECTION 

FROM   THE 

BEST  ENGLISH  ESSAYS 

BACON : 
MASTER   OF   CONDENSATION 

OF  all  English  prose  writers,  Bacon  is  the 
most  condensed.  His  successive  sen- 
tences approach  the  condensation  of  the 
proverb  and  the  aphorism.  In  the  essay  "  Of 
Studies  "  there  are  half  a  dozen  sentences  any 
one  of  which  a  modern  writer  might  take  as  a 
text  and  expand  into  a  good-sized  volume.  More- 
over, it  is  very  interesting  to  note  how  he  attains 
this  unusual  condensation,  namely,  in  the  simplest 
way  that  condensation  can  be  attained.  He  does 
no  more  than  state  a  simple  truth  in  the  most 
direct  and  simple  language  imaginable.  A  child 
may  do  that;  but  the  difference  between  a  child 
and  Bacon  is  that  Bacon's  simple  truth  has  such 
profound  and  far-reaching  applications.  When  a 
man  has  spent  a  lifetime  in  investigation  of  a 
subject,  so  that  it  is  as  familiar  to  him  as  his 
A  B  C's,  nothing  could  be  easier  or  simpler  for 
him  than  to  put  his  finger  on  the  central  point, 
the  heart  of  the  whole  subject.  If  he  displays 


4  Best  English  Essays 

any  peculiar  literary  skill,  it  is  chiefly  in  refrain- 
ing from  doing  anything  beside  putting  his  ringer 
on  the  point  of  interest  in  his  subject.  The  pro- 
fundity of  Bacon's  knowledge,  the  accuracy  and 
comprehensiveness  of  his  thought,  are  the  essen- 
tial things  in  his  essays.  Little  as  he  suspected 
it  when  he  wrote  them,  these  essays  afford  us  a 
key  to  the  conclusions  regarding  life  of  one  of 
the  profoundest  thinkers,  one  of  the  keenest 
observers,  and  one  of  the  most  learned  men  the 
world  has  ever  produced. 

As  Bacon  is  our  first  essayist,  the  history  of  his 
essays  is  interesting.  As  a  brilliant  conversa- 
tionist he  was  in  the  habit  of  jotting  down  in  his 
notebook  any  terse  or  suggestive  saying  he  heard, 
or  any  particularly  good  sentence  that  occurred  to 
him  in  the  ordinary  rounds  of  his  life  and  studies. 
In  1597  he  published  a  dozen  groups  of  these 
notes.  They  formed  only  a  few  pages  in  a  book 
that  contained  other  matter.  Nearly  every  sen- 
tence was  marked  with  the  sign  of  the  paragraph, 
showing  that  Bacon  presented  them  merely  as  a 
collection  of  epigrammatic  sentences.  By  far  the 
best  of  these  ten  original  essays  was  the  one  called 
"  Of  Studies."  The  book  as  a  whole,  however, 
was  popular,  and  in  1612  a  new  edition  was  pub- 
lished, in  which  nearly  all  the  original  essays 
were  enlarged  and  the  disjointed  notes  were  more 
closely  welded  together.  Many  essays  were 
added.  In  1625  the  final  edition,  as  we  now  have 
it,  appeared,  and  the  collections  of  notes  had 


Bacon  5 

grown  into  something  more  nearly  resembling 
the  modern  essay,  while  the  numerous  additions 
were  written  connectedly  and  at  greater  length. 

That  the  student  may  observe  this  process  of 
development  for  himself,  we  present  first  the 
original  form  of  the  essay  "  Of  Studies  "  very 
nearly  as  it  appeared  in  1597,  and  then  the  same 
essay  as  we  find  it  in  the  edition  of  1625.  This 
is  followed  by  two  essays,  "  Of  Truth "  and 
"  Of  Friendship,"  which  were  first  presented  in 
the  edition  of  1625.  The  latter  is  the  most  elab- 
orate and  connected,  and  it  will  be  very  interest- 
ing to  compare  this  essay  with  Emerson's  essay 
on  "  Friendship."  Emerson  was  the  same  sort 
of  writer  that  Bacon  was,  but  he  wrote  in  an  age 
when  people  read  too  hurriedly  and  too  exten- 
sively to  permit  the  classic  brevity  of  Bacon  to 
have  its  just  effect. 


OF    STUDIES 
(Version  of  1597)* 

STUDIES  serve  for  pastimes,  for  ornaments  and 
for  abilities.  Their  chief  use  for  pastime  is  in 
privatenes  and  retiring;  for  ornamente  is  in  dis- 
course, and  for  abilitie  is  in  judgement.  For  expert 
men  can  execute,  but  learned  men  are  fittest  to 
judge  or  censure. 

1  In  this  essay  the  original  spelling  is  retained. 


6  Best  English  Essays 

f  To  spend  too  much  time  in  them  is  slouth,  to  use 
them  too  much  for  ornament  is  affectation :  to  make 
judgement  wholly  by  their  rules,  is  the  humour  of 
a  Scholler.  HThey  perfect  Nature,  and  are  perfected 
by  experience.  IFCraftie  men  contemne  1  them,  simple 
men  admire  them,  wise  men  use  them:  For  they 
teach  not  their  owne  use,  but  that 2  is  a  wisedome 
without  them:  and  above  them  wonne  by  obser- 
vation. 1[Reade  not  to  contradict,  nor  to  believe,  but 
to  waigh  and  consider.  HSome  bookes  are  to  bee 
tasted,  others  to  bee  swallowed,  and  some  few  to  bee 
chewed  and  digested :  That  is,  some  bookes  are  to 
be  read  only  in  partes ;  others  to  be  read,  but  cur- 
sorily, and  some  few  to  be  read  wholly  and  with 
diligence  and  attention.  H"Reading  maketh  a  full 
man,  conference  a  readye  man,  and  writing  an 
exacte  man.  And  therefore  if  a  man  write  little, 
he  had  neede  have  a  great  memorie,  if  he  conferre 
little,  he  had  neede  have  a  present  wit,  and  if  he 
reade  little,  hee  had  neede  have  much  cunning,  to 
seeme  to  know  that  he  doth  not.  f  Histories  make 
men  wise,  Poets  wittie:  the  Mathematickes  subtle, 
naturall  Phylosophie  deepe :  Morall  grave,  Logicke 
and  Rhetoricke  able  to  contend. 


(Version  of  1625)* 

STUDIES  serve  for  delight,  for  ornament,  and  for 
ability.    Their  chief  use  for  delight  is  in  pri- 
vateness  and  retiring ;  for  ornament  is  in  discourse ; 

1  Misprinted  in  first  edition  "  continue." 

2  The  meaning  calls  for  "  there." 

8  In   this  and  the  following  essays,   the   spelling  has   been 
modernized. 


Bacon  7 

and  for  ability  is  in  the  judgment  and  disposition 
of  business.  For  expert  men  can  execute,  and  per- 
haps judge  of  particulars,  one  by  one;  but  the 
general  counsels,  and  the  plots  and  marshalling  of 
affairs,  come  best  from  those  that  are  learned.  To 
spend  too  much  time  in  studies  is  sloth,  to  use 
them  too  much  for  ornament  is  affectation,  to 
make  judgment  only  by  their  rules  is  the  humour 
of  a  scholar.  They  perfect  nature,  and  are  perfected 
by  experience.  For  natural  abilities  are  like  natu- 
ral plants,  that  need  pruning  by  study ;  and  studies 
themselves  do  give  forth  directions  too  much  at 
large,  except  they  be  bounded  in  by  experience. 
Crafty  men  contemn  studies,  simple  men  admire 
them,  and  wise  men  use  them ;  for  they  teach  not 
their  own  use,  but  that x  is  a  wisdom  without  them 
and  above  them,  won  by  observation. 

Read  not  to  contradict  and  confute,  nor  to  be- 
lieve and  take  for  granted,  nor  to  find  talk  and 
discourse,  but  to  weigh  and  consider.  Some  books 
are  to  be  tasted,  others  to  be  swallowed,  and  some 
few  to  be  chewed  and  digested :  that  is,  some 
books  are  to  be  read  only  in  parts;  others  to  be 
read,  but  not  curiously ;  and  some  few  to  be  read 
wholly,  and  with  diligence  and  attention.  Some 
books  also  may  be  read  by  deputy,  and  extracts 
made  of  them  by  others ;  but  that  would  be  only 
in  the  less  important  arguments  and  the  meaner 
sort  of  books;  else  distilled  books  are  like  com- 
mon distilled  waters,  flashy 2  things.  Reading 
maketh  a  full  man,  conference  a  ready  man,  and 
writing  an  exact  man.  And  therefore  if  a  man 
write  little,  he  had  need  have  a  great  memory;  if 

1  "There"  —  see  preceding  page.  2  Insipid. 


8  Best  English  Essays 

he  confer  little,  he  had  need  have  a  present  wit ; 
and  if  he  read  little,  he  had  need  have  much  cun- 
ning to  seem  to  know  that  he  doth  not. 

Histories  make  men  wise,  poets  witty,  the  math- 
ematics subtile,  natural  philosophy  deep,  moral 
grave,  logic  and  rhetoric  able  to  contend.  "  Abe- 
unt  studia  in  mores."  *  Nay,  there  is  no  stond  2 
or  impediment  in  the  wit  but  may  be  wrought 
out  by  fit  studies,  like  as  diseases  of  the  body  may 
have  appropriate  exercises.  Bowling  is  good  for 
the  stone  and  reins,  shooting  for  the  lungs  and 
breast,  gentle  walking  for  the  stomach,  riding  for 
the  head,  and  the  like.  So  if  a  man's  wit  be  wan- 
dering, let  him  study  the  mathematics ;  for  in  dem- 
onstrations, if  his  wit  be  called  away  never  so 
little,  he  must  begin  again.  If  his  wit  be  not  apt 
to  distinguish  or  find  differences,  let  him  study  the 
schoolmen,  for  they  are  cymini  sectores.3  If  he  be 
not  apt  to  beat  over  matters,  and  to  call  up  one 
thing  to  prove  and  illustrate  another,  let  him  study 
the  lawyers'  cases.  So  every  defect  of  the  mind 
may  have  a  special  receipt. 


OF    TRUTH 

WHAT  is  truth?"  said  jesting  Pilate;    and 
would  not  stay  for  an  answer.     Certain 
there  be  that  delight  in  giddiness;    and  count  it  a 

1  Bacon  elsewhere  paraphrases  this :  "  Studies  have  an  influence 
and  operation  upon  the  manners  of  those  that  are  conversant  in 
them." 

2  Stand.     Explained  by  the  next  word. 
8  Splitters  of  cumin-seeds. 


Bacon  9 

bondage  to  fix  a  belief ;  affecting *  free-will  in 
thinking,  as  well  as  in  acting.  And  though  the  sect 
of  philosophers  of  that  kind  be  gone,  yet  there  re- 
main certain  discoursing  wits  which  are  of  the  same 
veins,  though  there  be  not  so  much  blood  in  them  as 
was  in  those  of  the  ancients.  But  it  is  not  only 
the  difficulty  and  labour  which  men  take  in  finding 
out  of  truth;  nor  again,  that  when  it  is  found  it 
imposeth  upon  men's  thoughts,  that  doth  bring 
lies  in  favour:  but  a  natural  though  corrupt  love 
of  the  lie  itself.  One  of  the  later  school  of  the 
Grecians  examineth  the  matter,  and  is  at  a  stand 
to  think  what  should  be  in  it  that  men  should  love 
lies :  where  neither  they  make  for  pleasure,  as  with 
poets;  nor  for  advantage,  as  with  the  merchant; 
but  for  the  lie's  sake.  But  I  cannot  tell :  this  same 
truth  is  a  naked  and  open  daylight,  that  doth  not 
show  the  masks,  and  mummeries,  and  triumphs 
of  the  world  half  so  stately  and  daintily  as  candle- 
lights. Truth  may  perhaps  come  to  the  price  of 
a  pearl,  that  showeth  best  by  day;  but  it  will  not 
rise  to  the  price  of  a  diamond  or  carbuncle,  that 
showeth  best  in  varied  lights.  A  mixture  of  a  lie 
doth  ever  add  pleasure.  Doth  any  man  doubt, 
that  if  there  were  taken  out  of  men's  minds  vain 
opinions,  flattering  hopes,  false  valuations,  imag- 
inations as  one  would,  and  the  like,  but  it  would 
leave  the  minds  of  a  number  of  men  poor  shrunken 
things,  full  of  melancholy  and  indisposition,  and 
unpleasing  to  themselves?  One  of  the  Fathers,  in 
great  severity,  called  poesy  vinum  dcemonum,-  be- 
cause it  filleth  the  imagination,  and  yet  it  is  but 
with  the  shadow  of  a  lie.  But  it  is  not  the  lie  that 
1  Aiming  at.  2  The  wine  of  demons. 


io  Best  English  Essays 

passeth  through  the  mind,  but  the  lie  that  sinketh 
in,  and  settleth  in  it,  that  doth  the  hurt;  such  as 
we  spake  of  before.  But  howsoever  these  things 
are  thus  in  men's  depraved  judgments  and  affec- 
tions, yet  truth,  which  only  doth  judge  itself, 
teacheth  that  the  inquiry  of  truth,  which  is  the 
love-making  or  wooing  of  it ;  the  knowledge  of 
truth,  which  is  the  presence  of  it;  and  the  belief 
of  truth,  which  is  the  enjoying  of  it  —  is  the  sov- 
ereign good  of  human  nature.  The  first  creature 
of  God,  in  the  works  of  the  days,  was  the  light 
of  the  sense ;  the  last  was  the  light  of  reason ; 
and  his  Sabbath  work  ever  since  is  the  illumina- 
tion of  his  Spirit.  First  he  breathed  light  upon 
the  face  of  the  matter,  or  chaos ;  then  he  breathed 
light  into  the  face  of  man ;  and  still  he  breatheth 
and  inspireth  light  into  the  face  of  his  chosen. 
The  poet  that  beautified  the  sect  that  was  other- 
wise inferior  to  the  rest,  saith  yet  excellently  well: 
"  It  is  a  pleasure  to  stand  upon  the  shore,  and  to 
see  ships  tossed  upon  the  sea;  a  pleasure  to  stand 
in  the  window  of  a  castle,  and  to  see  a  battle,  and 
the  adventures  thereof  below :  but  no  pleasure  is 
comparable  to  the  standing  upon  the  vantage 
ground  of  truth  "  (a  hill  not  to  be  commanded, 
and  where  the  air  is  always  clear  and  serene) 
"  and  to  see  the  errors,  and  wanderings,  and  mists, 
and  tempests,  in  the  vale  below : "  so  always,  that 
this  prospect  be  with  pity,  and  not  with  swelling 
or  pride.  Certainly,  it  is  heaven  upon  earth  to 
have  a  man's  mind  move  in  charity,  rest  in  provi- 
dence, and  turn  upon  the  poles  of  truth. 

To  pass  from  theological  and  philosophical  truth 
to  the  truth  of  civil  business,  it  will  be  acknowl- 


Bacon  1 1 

edged,  even  by  those  that  practise  it  not,  that 
clear  and  round  dealing  is  the  honour  of  man's 
nature ;  and  that  mixture  of  falsehood  is  like  alloy 
in  coin  of  gold  and  silver:  which  may  make  the 
metal  work  the  better,  but  it  embaseth  it.  For 
these  winding  and  crooked  courses  are  the  goings 
of  the  serpent,  which  goeth  basely  upon  the  belly, 
and  not  upon  the  feet.  There  is  no  vice  that  doth 
so  cover  a  man  with  shame  as  to  be  found  false 
and  perfidious.  And  therefore  Montaigne  saith 
prettily,  when  he  inquired  the  reason  why  the  word 
of  the  lie  should  be  such  a  disgrace,  and  such  an 
odious  charge :  saith  he,  "  If  it  be  well  weighed, 
to  say  that  a  man  lieth  is  as  much  as  to  say  that 
he  is  brave  towards  God  and  a  coward  towards 
men."  For  a  lie  faces  God,  and  shrinks  from 
man.  Surely  the  wickedness  of  falsehood,  and 
breach  of  faith,  cannot  possibly  be  so  highly  ex- 
pressed as  in  that  it  shall  be  the  last  peal  to  call 
the  judgments  of  God  upon  the  generations  of 
men :  it  being  foretold  that  when  Christ  cometh 
"  He  shall  not  find  faith  upon  the  earth." 


OF    FRIENDSHIP 

IT  had  been  hard  for  him  that  spake  it  to  have  put 
more  truth  and  untruth  together  in  few  words 
than  in  that  speech,  "  Whosoever  is  delighted  in 
solitude  is  either  a  wild  beast  or  a  god."  For  it 
is  most  true  that  a  natural  and  secret  hatred  and 
aversation  towards  society  in  any  man  hath  some- 
what of  the  savage  beast;  but  it  is  most  untrue 
that  it  should  have  any  character  at  all  of  the  divine 


12  Best  English  Essays 

nature,  except  it  proceed,  not  out  of  a  pleasure  in 
solitude,  but  out  of  a  love  and  desire  to  sequester 
a  man's  self  for  a  higher  conversation:  such  as  is 
found  to  have  been  falsely  and  feignedly  in  some 
of  the  heathen,  as  Epimenides  the  Candian,  Numa 
the  Roman,  Empedocles  the  Sicilian,  and  Apollo- 
nius  of  Tyana ;  and  truly  and  really  in  divers  of  the 
ancient  hermits  and  holy  fathers  of  the  Church. 
But  little  do  men  perceive  what  solitude  is,  and 
how  far  it  extendeth;  for  a  crowd  is  not  company, 
and  faces  are  but  a  gallery  of  pictures,  and  talk 
but  a  tinkling  cymbal,  where  there  is  no  love. 
The  Latin  adage  meeteth  with  it  a  little,  "  Magna 
civitas,  magna  solitudo  " ; x  because  in  a  great  town 
friends  are  scattered,  so  that  there  is  not  that  fel- 
lowship, for  the  most  part,  which  is  in  less  neigh- 
bourhoods. But  we  may  go  further,  and  affirm 
most  truly  that  it  is  a  mere  2  and  miserable  solitude 
to  want  true  friends,  without  which  the  world  is 
but  a  wilderness.  And  even  in  this  sense  also  of 
solitude,  whosoever  in  the  frame  of  his  nature  and 
affections  is  unfit  for  friendship,  he  taketh  it  of  the 
beast,  and  not  from  humanity. 

A  principal  fruit  of  friendship  is  the  ease  and 
discharge  of  the  fulness  and  swellings  of  the  heart, 
which  passions  of  all  kinds  do  cause  and  induce. 
We  know  diseases  of  stoppings  and  suffocations 
are  the  most  dangerous  in  the  body,  and  it  is  not 
much  otherwise  in  the  mind ;  you  may  take  sarza  3 
to  open  the  liver,  steel  to  open  the  spleen,  flowers  of 
sulphur  for  the  lungs,  castoreum  for  the  brain,  but 
no  receipt  openeth  the  heart  but  a  true  friend,  to 

1  A  great  town  is  a  great  solitude. 

2  Utter.  3  Sarsaparilla. 


Bacon  13 

whom  you  may  impart  griefs,  joys,  fears,  hopes, 
suspicions,  counsels,  and  whatsoever  lieth  upon  the 
heart  to  oppress  it,  in  a  kind  of  civil  shrift  or 
confession. 

It  is  a  strange  thing  to  observe  how  high  a  rate 
great  kings  and  monarchs  do  set  upon  this  fruit  of 
friendship  whereof  we  speak ;  so  great  as  they  pur- 
chase it  many  times  at  the  hazard  of  their  own 
safety  and  greatness.  For  princes,  in  regard  of 
the  distance  of  their  fortune  from  that  of  their  sub- 
jects and  servants,  cannot  gather  this  fruit  except, 
to  make  themselves  capable  thereof,  they  raise 
some  persons  to  be,  as  it  were,  companions  and 
almost  equals  to  themselves,  which  many  times 
sorteth  to  inconvenience.  The  modern  languages 
give  unto  such  persons  the  name  of  favourites  or 
privadoes,  as  if  it  were  matter  of  grace  or  conver- 
sation ;  but  the  Roman  name  attaineth  the  true 
use  and  cause  thereof,  naming  them  "  participes 
curarum," x  for  it  is  that  which  tieth  the  knot. 
And  we  see  plainly  that  this  hath  been  done,  not 
by  weak  and  passionate  princes  only,  but  by  the 
wisest  and  most  politic  that  ever  reigned ;  who  have 
oftentimes  joined  to  themselves  some  of  their  ser- 
vants, whom  both  themselves  have  called  friends, 
and  allowed  others  likewise  to  call  them  in  the 
same  manner,  using  the  word  which  is  received 
between  private  men. 

L.  Sylla,  when  he  commanded  Rome,  raised 
Pompey,  after  surnamed  the  Great,  to  that  height 
that  Pompey  vaunted  himself  for  Sylla's  over- 
match. For  when  he  had  carried  the  consulship 
for  a  friend  of  his  against  the  pursuit  of  Sylla,  and 

1  Partners  in  cares. 


14  Best  English  Essays 

that  Sylla  did  a  little  resent  thereat,  and  began  to 
speak  great,  Pompey  turned  upon  him  again,  and 
in  effect  bade  him  be  quiet,  "  for  that  more  men 
adored  the  sun  rising  than  the  sun  setting."  With 
Julius  Caesar,  Decimus  Brutus  had  obtained  that 
interest,  as  he  set  him  down  in  his  testament  for 
heir  in  remainder  after  his  nephew.  And  this  was 
the  man  that  had  power  with  him  to  draw  him 
forth  to  his  death.  For  when  Caesar  would  have 
discharged  the  senate,  in  regard  of  some  ill  pre- 
sages, and  especially  a  dream  of  Calpurnia,  this  man 
lifted  him  gently  by  the  arm  out  of  his  chair,  tell- 
ing him  he  hoped  he  would  not  dismiss  the  senate 
till  his  wife  had  dreamt  a  better  dream.  And 
it  seemeth  his  favour  was  so  great  as  Antonius, 
in  a  letter  which  is  recited  verbatim  in  one  of 
Cicero's  Philippics,  calleth  him  "  venefica,"  witch, 
as  if  he  had  enchanted  Caesar.  Augustus  raised 
Agrippa,  though  of  mean  birth,  to  that  height 
as,  when  he  consulted  with  Maecenas  about  the 
marriage  of  his  daughter  Julia,  Maecenas  took 
the  liberty  to  tell  him,  "  That  he  must  either  marry 
his  daughter  to  Agrippa  or  take  away  his  life; 
there  was  no  third  way,  he  had  made  him  so 
great."  With  Tiberius  Caesar,  Sejanus  had  as- 
cended to  that  height  as  they  two  were  termed  and 
reckoned  as  a  pair  of  friends.  Tiberius  in  a  letter 
to  him  saith :  "  Haec  pro  amicitia  nostra  non  oc- 
cultavi " ; x  and  the  whole  senate  dedicated  an 
altar  to  friendship,  as  to  a  goddess,  in  respect  of 
the  great  dearness  of  friendship  between  them  two. 
The  like  or  more  was  between  Septimius  Severus 

1  On  account  of  our  friendship  I  have  not  kept  these  things 
back. 


Bacon  15 

and  Plautianus.  For  he  forced  his  eldest  son  to 
marry  the  daughter  of  Plautianus,  and  would  often 
maintain  Plautianus  in  doing  affronts  to  his  son ; 
and  did  write  also  in  a  letter  to  the  senate  by  these 
words :  "  I  love  the  man  so  well  as  I  wish  he  may 
over-live  me."  Now,  if  these  princes  had  been  as 
a  Trajan,  or  a  Marcus  Aurelius,  a  man  might  have 
thought  that  this  had  proceeded  of  an  abundant 
goodness  of  nature;  but  being  men  so  wise,  of 
such  strength  and  severity  of  mind,  and  so  extreme 
lovers  of  themselves,  as  all  these  were,  it  proveth 
most  plainly  that  they  found  their  own  felicity, 
though  as  great  as  ever  happened  to  mortal  men, 
but  as  a  half-piece,  except  they  mought  have  a 
friend  to  make  it  entire.  And  yet,  which  is  more, 
they  were  princes  which  had  wives,  sons,  nephews ; 
and  yet  all  these  could  not  supply  the  comfort  of 
friendship. 

It  is  not  to  be  forgotten  what  Commineus  ob- 
serveth  of  his  first  master,  Duke  Charles  the  Hardy ; 
namely,  that  he  would  communicate  his  secrets 
with  none,  and  least  of  all  those  secrets  which 
troubled  him  most.  Whereupon  he  goeth  on,  and 
saith  that  towards  his  latter  time  "  that  close- 
ness did  impair,  and  a  little  perish  his  under- 
standing." Surely  Commineus  mought  have  made 
the  same  judgment  also,  if  it  had  pleased  him, 
of  his  second  master,  Louis  XL,  whose  closeness 
was  indeed  his  tormentor.  The  parable  of  Pythag- 
oras is  dark  but  true :  "  Cor  ne  edito,"  eat  not 
the  heart.  Certainly,  if  a  man  would  give  it  a 
hard  phrase,  those  that  want  friends  to  open  them- 
selves unto  are  cannibals  of  their  own  hearts. 
But  one  thing  is  most  admirable  (wherewith  I 


1 6  Best  English  Essays 

will  conclude  this  first-fruit  of  friendship),  which 
is,  that  this  communicating  of  a  man's  self  to  his 
friend  works  two  contrary  effects :  for  it  redoubleth 
joys,  and  cutteth  griefs  in  halves.  For  there  is 
no  man  that  imparteth  his  joys  to  his  friend,  but 
he  joyeth  the  more;  and  no  man  that  imparteth 
his  griefs  to  his  friend,  but  he  grieveth  the  less. 
So  that  it  is,  in  truth,  of  operation  upon  a  man's 
mind,  of  like  virtue  as  the  alchemists  used  to 
attribute  to  their  stone  for  man's  body,  that  it 
worketh  all  contrary  effects,  but  still  to  the  good 
and  benefit  of  nature.  But  yet,  without  praying 
in  aid  of  alchemists,  there  is  a  manifest  image  of 
this  in  the  ordinary  course  of  nature.  For  in 
bodies,  union  strengthened  and  cherisheth  any 
natural  action,  and,  on  the  other  side,  weakeneth 
and  dulleth  any  violent  impression:  and  even  so 
is  it  of  minds. 

The  second  fruit  of  friendship  is  healthful  and 
sovereign  for  the  understanding,  as  the  first  is  for 
the  affections.  For  friendship  maketh  indeed  a 
fair  day  in  the  affections  from  storm  and  tempests ; 
but  it  maketh  daylight  in  the  understanding  out 
of  darkness  and  confusion  of  thoughts.  Neither 
is  this  to  be  understood  only  of  faithful  counsel, 
which  a  man  receiveth  from  his  friend ;  but  before 
you  come  to  that,  certain  it  is,  that  whosoever  hath 
his  mind  fraught  with  many  thoughts,  his  wits 
and  understanding  do  clarify  and  break  up  in  the 
communicating  and  discoursing  with  another:  he 
tosseth  his  thoughts  more  easily,  he  marshalleth 
them  more  orderly,  he  seeth  how  they  look  when 
they  are  turned  into  words;  finally,  he  waxeth 
wiser  than  himself,  and  that  more  by  an  hour's 


Bacon  17 

discourse  than  by  a  day's  meditation.  It  was 
well  said  by  Themistocles  to  the  King  of  Persia, 
"  That  speech  was  like  cloth  of  Arras,  opened  and 
put  abroad,  whereby  the  imagery  doth  appear  in 
figure;  whereas  in  thoughts  they  lie  but  as  in 
packs."  Neither  is  this  second  fruit  of  friend- 
ship, in  opening  the  understanding,  restrained 
only  to  such  friends  as  are  able  to  give  a  man 
counsel;  they  indeed  are  best,  but  even  without 
that,  a  man  learneth  of  himself,  and  bringeth  his 
own  thoughts  to  light,  and  whetteth  his  wits  as 
against  a  stone,  which  itself  cuts  not.  In  a  word, 
a  man  were  better  relate  himself  to  a  statua  or 
picture,  than  to  suffer  his  thoughts  to  pass  in 
smother. 

Add  now,  to  make  this  second  fruit  of  friend- 
ship complete,  that  other  point  which  lieth  more 
open,  and  falleth  within  vulgar  observation :  which 
is  faithful  counsel  from  a  friend.  Heraclitus  saith 
well  in  one  of  his  enigmas,  "  Dry  light  is  ever 
the  best."  And  certain  it  is,  that  the  light  that 
a  man  receiveth  by  counsel  from  another  is  drier 
and  purer  than  that  which  cometh  from  his  own 
understanding  and  judgment,  which  is  ever  infused 
and  drenched  in  his  affections  and  customs.  So 
as  there  is  as  much  difference  between  the  counsel 
that  a  friend  giveth,  and  that  a  man  giveth  himself, 
as  there  is  between  the  counsel  of  a  friend  and  of  a 
flatterer.  For  there  is  no  such  flatterer  as  is  a 
man's  self;  and  there  is  no  such  remedy  against 
flattery  of  a  man's  self  as  the  liberty  of  a  friend. 
Counsel  is  of  two  sorts :  the  one  concerning  man- 
ners, the  other  concerning  business.  For  the 
first,  the  best  preservative  to  keep  the  mind  in 


1 8  Best  English  Essays 

health  is  the  faithful  admonition  of  a  friend.  The 
calling  of  a  man's  self  to  a  strict  account  is  a 
medicine  sometime  too  piercing  and  corrosive. 
Reading  good  books  of  morality  is  a  little  flat  and 
dead.  Observing  our  faults  in  others  is  sometimes 
unproper  for  our  case.  But  the  best  receipt  (best, 
I  say,  to  work,  and  best  to  take)  is  the  admonition 
of  a  friend.  It  is  a  strange  thing  to  behold  what 
gross  errors  and  extreme  absurdities  many,  espe- 
cially of  the  greater  sort,  do  commit  for  want  of 
a  friend  to  tell  them  of  them ;  to  the  great  damage 
both  of  their  fame  and  fortune.  For,  as  St.  James 
saith,  they  are  as  men  "  that  look  sometimes  into 
a  glass,  and  presently  forget  their  own  shape  and 
favour."  As  for  business,  a  man  may  think  if  he 
will  that  two  eyes  see  no  more  than  one;  or  that 
a  gamester  seeth  always  more  than  a  looker-on; 
or  that  a  man  in  anger  is  as  wise  as  he  that  hath 
said  over  the  four-and-twenty  letters;  or  that  a 
musket  may  be  shot  off  as  well  upon  the  arm  as 
upon  a  rest;  and  such  other  fond  and  high  imag- 
inations, to  think  himself  all  in  all.  But  when  all 
is  done,  the  help  of  good  counsel  is  that  which 
setteth  business  straight.  And  if  any  man  think 
that  he  will  take  counsel,  but  it  shall  be  by  pieces ; 
asking  counsel  in  one  business  of  one  man,  and 
in  another  business  of  another  man;  it  is  well 
(that  is  to  say,  better  perhaps  than  if  he  asked  none 
at  all);  but  he  runneth  two  dangers:  one,  that 
he  shall  not  be  faithfully  counselled ;  —  for  it  is  a 
rare  thing,  except  it  be  from  a  perfect  and  entire 
friend,  to  have  counsel  given,  but  such  as  shall 
be  bowed  and  crooked  to  some  ends  which  he  hath 
that  giveth  it ; — the  other,  that  he  shall  have  counsel 


Bacon  19 

given,  hurtful  and  unsafe,  though  with  good  mean- 
ing, and  mixed  partly  of  mischief  and  partly  of 
remedy;  even  as  if  you  would  call  a  physician 
that  is  thought  good  for  the  cure  of  the  disease 
you  complain  of,  but  is  unacquainted  with  your 
body,  and  therefore  may  put  you  in  way  for  a 
present  cure,  but  overthroweth  your  health  in 
some  other  kind,  and  so  cure  the  disease  and  kill 
the  patient.  But  a  friend  that  is  wholly  acquainted 
with  a  man's  estate  will  beware  by  furthering  any 
present  business  how  he  dasheth  upon  other  in- 
convenience. And,  therefore,  rest  not  upon  scat- 
tered counsels ;  they  will  rather  distract  and  mislead 
than  settle  and  direct. 

After  these  two  noble  fruits  of  friendship  (peace 
in  the  affections,  and  support  of  the  judgment) 
followeth  the  last  fruit,  which  is  like  the  pomegran- 
ate, full  of  many  kernels :  I  mean  aid,  and  bearing 
a  part  in  all  actions  and  occasions.  Here,  the 
best  way  to  represent  to  life  the  manifold  use  of 
friendship,  is  to  cast  and  see  how  many  things 
there  are  which  a  man  cannot  do  himself;  and 
then  it  will  appear  that  it  was  a  sparing  speech  of 
the  ancients  to  say,  "  That  a  friend  is  another 
himself  " ;  for  that  a  friend  is  far  more  than  him- 
self. Men  have  their  time,  and  die  many  times  in 
desire  of  some  things  which  they  principally  take 
to  heart, — the  bestowing  of  a  child,  the  finishing  of 
a  work,  or  the  like.  If  a  man  have  a  true  friend, 
he  may  rest  almost  secure  that  the  care  of  those 
things  will  continue  after  him.  So  that  a  man  hath, 
as  it  were,  two  lives  in  his  desires.  A  man  hath  a 
body,  and  that  body  is  confined  to  a  place;  but 
where  friendship  is,  all  offices  of  life  are,  as  it  were, 


2O  Best  English  Essays 

granted  to  him  and  his  deputy,  for  he  may  exercise 
them  by  his  friend.  How  many  things  are  there 
which  a  man  cannot,  with  any  face  or  comeliness, 
say  or  do  himself!  A  man  can  scarce  allege  his 
own  merits  with  modesty,  much  less  extol  them ; 
a  man  cannot  sometimes  brook  to  supplicate  or 
beg;  and  a  number  of  the  like.  But  all  these 
things  are  graceful  in  a  friend's  mouth,  which  are 
blushing  in  a  man's  own.  So  again,  a  man's  per- 
son hath  many  proper  *  relations  which  he  cannot 
put  off.  A  man  cannot  speak  to  his  son  but  as  a 
father ;  to  his  wife  but  as  a  husband ;  to  his  enemy 
but  upon  terms ;  whereas  a  friend  may  speak  as 
the  case  requires,  and  not  as  it  sorteth  with  the 
person.  But  to  enumerate  these  things  were  end- 
less. I  have  given  the  rule  where  a  man  cannot 
fitly  play  his  own  part :  if  he  have  not  a  friend,  he 
may  quit  the  stage. 

1  Personal,  peculiar. 


II 

SWIFT 


SWIFT: 
THE   GREATEST   ENGLISH    SATIRIST 

IN  his  lecture  on  Swift,  Thackeray  gives  us 
a  masterly  picture  of  the  famous  Dean  of 
St.  Patrick's,  but  tells  us  he  was  a  very  bad 
man.  Certainly  there  is  nothing  very  agreeable 
about  Swift,  and  though  we  have  already  de- 
scribed him  as  in  a  way  the  typical  preacher  of 
his  day,  he  is  not  such  a  man  as  we  should  like 
to  have  occupy  the  pulpit  of  the  church  we  go 
to.  For  all  that,  we  are  forced  to  admit  that  in 
his  writings  it  is  the  element  of  truth  that  has 
preserved  them.  "  Gulliver's  Travels  "  is  read 
to-day,  and  will  continue  to  be  read  by  the 
average  man  long  after  every  one  of  Swift's 
contemporaries  has  been  relegated  to  the  literary 
attic.  Possibly  he  will  be  read  as  a  mere  story 
teller,  by  children  who  suspect  him  of  ferocity 
as  little  as  they  suspect  the  pussy-cat  in  the 
corner.  Still,  it  is  very  remarkable  that  the 
most  pungent  satire  in  the  language  and  one  of 
the  most  simple  and  fascinating  stories  can  exist 
together  in  the  same  literary  composition.  The 


24  Best  English  Essays 

only  way  to  account  for  it  is  to  suppose  that  Swift 
told  the  simple  truth  without  in  any  way  disfig- 
uring it  by  his  moroseness  of  temper. 

In  his  literary  style,  Swift  belongs  to  the  same 
classic  school  as  Bacon.  Like  Bacon,  he  states 
simple  truths  in  the  plainest  and  simplest  manner ; 
but  while  Bacon  selected  profound  truths,  Swift, 
actuated  by  the  mad  bitterness  of  his  temper,  was 
always  putting  his  finger  with  unerring  accuracy 
on  the  weak  points  of  human  nature.  He  tells 
his  simple  story  in  his  smooth  and  simple  way, 
with  no  ornament,  no  exaggeration.  No  reader 
can  question,  much  less  deny,  a  single  syllable; 
but  when  he  looks  up  and  catches  the  old  fellow's 
malicious  eye,  his  very  flesh  creeps  under  the 
stinging  satire  of  the  truth  that  the  Dean  states 
so  suavely  and  so  accurately.  The  Dean  is  bitter 
and  malicious  as  no  other  man  ever  was;  but 
he  is  strictly  truthful;  and  since  he  is  truthful 
we  cannot  believe  that  he  has  ever  done  human 
nature  any  harm. 

To  be  sure,  Swift  might  have  applied  the  puri- 
fying caustic  with  heartfelt  love  instead  of  ma- 
licious glee.  The  "  Modest  Proposal  "  for  eating 
children  is  so  repulsive,  so  sickeningly  ferocious, 
that  we  prefer  to  pass  it  by  even  though  it  is  one 
of  the  most  remarkable  pieces  of  literature  of  its 
kind.  Compare  with  it  the  same  kind  of  satire 
on  the  same  subject,  inspired  by  the  same  bitter- 
ness of  heart,  that  we  find  in  the  following  para- 
graph from  Ruskin's  "Fors  Clavigera,"  a  propos 


Swift  25 

of   the   English   gentleman's   delight   in   killing 
things  for  sport:  — 

"  Of  course,  all  this  is  natural  to  a  sporting 
people  who  have  learned  to  like  the  smell  of  gun- 
powder, sulphur,  and  gas  tar  better  than  that  of 
violets  and  thyme.  But,  putting  baby-poisoning, 
pigeon-shooting,  and  rabbit-shooting  to-day  in  com- 
parison with  the  pleasures  of  the  German  Madonna 
and  her  simple  company,  and  of  Chaucer  and  his 
carolling  company :  and  seeing  that  the  present  ef- 
fect of  peace  upon  earth,  and  well-pleasing  in  men, 
is  that  every  nation  now  spends  most  of  its  income 
in  machinery  for  shooting  the  best  and  the  bravest 
men  just  when  they  were  likely  to  have  become  of 
some  use  to  their  fathers  and  mothers,  I  put  it  to 
you,  my  friends  all,  —  calling  you  so,  I  suppose  for 
the  last  time,  unless  you  are  disposed  for  friendship 
with  Herod  instead  of  Barabbas,  —  whether  it  would 
not  be  more  kind  and  less  expensive  to  make  the 
machinery  a  little  smaller,  and  adapt  it  to  spare 
opium  now,  and  expenses  of  maintenance  and  edu- 
cation afterwards  (beside  no  end  of  diplomacy), 
by  taking  our  sport  in  shooting  babies  instead  of 
rabbits?" 

There  is  no  doubt,  however,  that  Swift's  pitch- 
fork has  pricked  more  skins  than  Ruskin's  subtle 
needle-point. 

Swift's  best  satirical  essay  is  undoubtedly  his 
first,  "  A  Tale  of  a  Tub."  In  its  digression  and 
variety  of  topics  it  is  a  typical  essay,  and  its 
amusing  little  tale  has  a  very  deep  political  sig- 
nificance; for  Peter  [St.  Peter]  is  merely  Swift's 


26  Best  English  Essays 

name  for  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  Martin 
[Luther]  for  the  Episcopal  or  English  Church, 
and  Jack  [Calvin]  for  the  Presbyterian  or  Non- 
conformist Church.  The  satire  on  booksellers  in 
the  "  Bookseller's  Dedication  "  and  the  satire  on 
current  authors  in  the  dedication  to  "  Prince 
Posterity  "  have  nearly  as  much  point  to-day  as 
when  they  were  written.  Altogether  these  three 
or  four  selections,  complete  in  themselves,  give 
also  a  very  good  impression  of  "  A  Tale  of  a 
Tub  "  as  a  whole. 


A   TALE   OF   A   TUB 
THE  BOOKSELLER'S  DEDICATION 

TO 
THE   RIGHT    HONOURABLE   JOHN    LORD   SOMERS 

MY  LORD, 

THO'  the  author  has  written  a  large  Dedication, 
yet  that  being  addressed  to  a  prince,  whom  I 
am  never  likely  to  have  the  honour  of  being  known 
to ;  a  person  besides,  as  far  as  I  can  observe,  not  at 
all  regarded,  or  thought  on  by  any  of  our  present 
writers;  and  being  wholly  free  from  that  slavery 
which  booksellers  usually  lie  under,  to  the  caprices 
of  authors ;  I  think  it  a  wise  piece  of  presumption 
to  inscribe  these  papers  to  your  Lordship,  and  to 
implore  your  Lordship's  protection  of  them.  God 
and  your  Lordship  know  their  faults  and  their 


Swift  27 

merits;  for,  as  to  my  own  particular,  I  am  alto- 
gether a  stranger  to  the  matter ;  and  though  every- 
body else  should  be  equally  ignorant,  I  do  not  fear 
the  sale  of  the  book,  at  all  the  worse,  upon  that 
score.  Your  Lordship's  name  on  the  front  in  capital 
letters  will  at  any  time  get  off  one  edition :  neither 
would  I  desire  any  other  help  to  grow  an  alderman, 
than  a  patent  for  the  sole  privilege  of  dedicating  to 
your  Lordship. 

I  should  now,  in  right  of  a  dedicator,  give  your 
Lordship  a  list  of  your  own  virtues,  and,  at  the  same 
time,  be  very  unwilling  to  offend  your  modesty ;  but 
chiefly,  I  should  celebrate  your  liberality  towards 
men  of  great  parts  and  small  fortunes,  and  give  you 
broad  hints  that  I  mean  myself.  And  I  was  just 
going  on,  in  the  usual  method,  to  peruse  a  hundred 
or  two  of  dedications,  and  transcribe  an  abstract  to 
be  applied  to  your  Lordship ;  but  I  was  diverted  by 
a  certain  accident.  For,  upon  the  covers  of  these 
papers,  I  casually  observed  written  in  large  letters 
the  two  following  words,  DETUR  DIGNISSIMO ; 
which,  for  aught  I  knew,  might  contain  some  im- 
portant meaning.  But  it  unluckily  fell  out,  that 
none  of  the  authors  I  employ  understood  Latin; 
(though  I  have  them  often  in  pay  to  translate  out  of 
that  language;)  I  was  therefore  compelled  to  have 
recourse  to  the  curate  of  our  parish,  who  englished 
it  thus,  Let  it  be  given  to  the  worthiest:  and  his 
comment  was,  that  the  author  meant  his  work  should 
be  dedicated  to  the  sublimest  genius  of  the  age  for 
wit,  learning,  judgment,  eloquence,  and  wisdom. 
I  called  at  a  poet's  chamber  (who  works  for  my 
shop)  in  an  alley  hard  by,  showed  him  the  transla- 
tion, and  desired  his  opinion,  who  it  was  that  the 


28  Best  English  Essays 

author  could  mean:  he  told  me,  after  some  con- 
sideration, that  vanity  was  a  thing  he  abhorred ;  but, 
by  the  description,  he  thought  himself  to  be  the  per- 
son aimed  at ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  he  very  kindly 
offered  his  own  assistance  gratis  towards  penning 
a  dedication  to  himself.  I  desired  him,  however,  to 
give  a  second  guess.  Why,  then,  said  he,  it  must 
be  I,  or  my  Lord  Somers.  From  thence  I  went  to 
several  other  wits  of  my  acquaintance,  with  no  small 
hazard  and  weariness  to  my  person,  from  a  prodi- 
gious number  of  dark,  winding  stairs;  but  found 
them  all  in  the  same  story,  both  of  your  Lordship 
and  themselves.  Now,  your  Lordship  is  to  under- 
stand, that  this  proceeding  was  not  of  my  own  in- 
vention ;  for  I  have  somewhere  heard  it  is  a  maxim, 
that  those  to  whom  everybody  allows  the  second 
place,  have  an  undoubted  title  to  the  first. 

This  infallibly  convinced  me,  that  your  Lord- 
ship was  the  person  intended  by  the  author.  But, 
being  very  unacquainted  in  the  style  and  form  of 
dedications,  I  employed  those  wits  aforesaid  to 
furnish  me  with  hints  and  materials,  towards  a 
panegyric  upon  your  Lordship's  virtues. 

In  two  days  they  brought  me  ten  sheets  of  paper, 
filled  up  on  every  side.  They  swore  to  me,  that  they 
had  ransacked  whatever  could  be  found  in  the  char- 
acters of  Socrates,  Aristides,  Epaminondas,  Cato, 
Tully,  Atticus,  and  other  hard  names,  which  I  can- 
not now  recollect.  However,  I  have  reason  to  be- 
lieve, they  imposed  upon  my  ignorance;  because, 
when  I  came  to  read  over  their  collections,  there 
was  not  a  syllable  there,  but  what  I  and  everybody 
else  knew  as  well  as  themselves :  Therefore  I  griev- 
ously suspect  a  cheat;  and  that  these  authors  of 


Swift  29 

mine  stole  and  transcribed  every  word,  from  the 
universal  report  of  mankind.  So  that  I  look  upon 
myself  as  fifty  shillings  out  of  pocket,  to  no  manner 
of  purpose. 

If,  by  altering  the  title,  I  could  make  the  same 
materials  serve  for  another  Dedication,  (as  my  bet- 
ters have  done, )  it  would  help  to  make  up  my  loss ; 
but  I  have  made  several  persons  dip  here  and  there 
in  those  papers,  and  before  they  read  three  lines, 
they  have  all  assured  me  plainly,  that  they  can- 
not possibly  be  applied  to  any  person  besides  your 
Lordship. 

I  expected,  indeed,  to  have  heard  of  your  Lord- 
ship's bravery  at  the  head  of  an  army;  of  your 
undaunted  courage  in  mounting  a  breach,  or  scaling 
a  wall;  or,  to  have  had  your  pedigree  traced  in  a 
lineal  descent  from  the  house  of  Austria;  or,  of 
your  wonderful  talent  at  dress  and  dancing;  or, 
your  profound  knowledge  in  algebra,  metaphysics, 
and  the  oriental  tongues.  But  to  ply  the  world  with 
an  old  beaten  story  of  your  wit,  and  eloquence,  and 
learning,  and  wisdom,  and  justice,  and  politeness, 
and  candor,  and  evenness  of  temper  in  all  scenes  of 
life ;  of  that  great  discernment  in  discovering,  and 
readiness  in  favouring  deserving  men;  with  forty 
other  common  topics ;  I  confess,  I  have  neither  con- 
science nor  countenance  to  do  it.  Because  there 
is  no  virtue,  either  of  a  public  or  private  life,  which 
some  circumstances  of  your  own  have  not  often  pro- 
duced upon  the  stage  of  the  world ;  and  those  few, 
which,  for  want  of  occasions  to  exert  them,  might 
otherwise  have  passed  unseen,  or  unobserved,  by 
your  friends,  your  enemies  have  at  length  brought 
to  light. 


30  Best  English  Essays 

'T  is  true,  I  should  be  very  loth,  the  bright  ex- 
ample of  your  Lordship's  virtues  should  be  lost  to 
after-ages,  both  for  their  sake  and  your  own;  but 
chiefly  because  they  will  be  so  very  necessary  to 
adorn  the  history  of  a  late  reign;  *  and  that  is  an- 
other reason  why  I  would  forbear  to  make  a  recital 
of  them  here ;  because  I  have  been  told  by  wise  men, 
that,  as  Dedications  have  run  for  some  years  past, 
a  good  historian  will  not  be  apt  to  have  recourse 
thither  in  search  of  characters. 

There  is  one  point,  wherein  I  think  we  dedicators 
would  do  well  to  change  our  measures;  I  mean, 
instead  of  running  on  so  far  upon  the  praise  of  our 
patrons'  liberality,  to  spend  a  word  or  two  in  admir- 
ing their  patience.  I  can  put  no  greater  compliment 
on  your  Lordship's,  than  by  giving  you  so  ample  an 
occasion  to  exercise  it  at  present.  —  Though  per- 
haps I  shall  not  be  apt  to  reckon  much  merit  to  your 
Lordship  upon  that  score,  who  having  been  for- 
merly used  to  tedious  harangues,  and  sometimes  to 
as  little  purpose,  will  be  the  readier  to  pardon  this ; 
especially,  when  it  is  offered  by  one,  who  is  with  all 
respect  and  veneration, 
MY  LORD, 

Your  Lordship's  most  obedient, 

And  most  faithful  servant, 

THE    BOOKSELLER.2 

1  King  William's. 

2  The  bookseller  in  whose  person  Swift  writes  this  dedication 
was  John  Nutt. 


Swift  3 1 

THE  EPISTLE  DEDICATORY 

TO 

HIS  ROYAL  HIGHNESS  PRINCE  POSTERITY1 

SIR, 

I  HERE  present  Your  Highness  with  the  fruits 
of  a  very  few  leisure  hours,  stolen  from  the 
short  intervals  of  a  world  of  business  and  of  an  em- 
ployment quite  alien  from  such  amusements  as  this ; 
the  poor  production  of  that  refuse  of  time,  which 
has  lain  heavy  upon  my  hands,  during  a  long  pro- 
rogation of  parliament,  a  great  dearth  of  foreign 
news,  and  a  tedious  fit  of  rainy  weather ;  for  which, 
and  other  reasons,  it  cannot  choose  extremely  to 
deserve  such  a  patronage  as  that  of  Your  Highness, 
whose  numberless  virtues,  in  so  few  years,  make  the 
world  look  upon  you  as  the  future  example  to  all 
princes ;  for  although  Your  Highness  is  hardly  got 
clear  of  infancy,  yet  has  the  universal  learned  world 
already  resolved  upon  appealing  to  your  future  dic- 
tates, with  the  lowest  and  most  resigned  submission  ; 
fate  having  decreed  you  sole  arbiter  of  the  produc- 
tions of  human  wit,  in  this  polite  and  most  accom- 
plished age.  Methinks,  the  number  of  appellants 
were  enough  to  shock  and  startle  any  judge,  of  a 
genius  less  unlimited  than  yours:  but,  in  order  to 
prevent  such  glorious  trials,  the  person  (it  seems) 
to  whose  care  the  education  of  Your  Highness  is 

1  It  is  the  usual  style  of  decried  writers  to  appeal  to  Posterity, 
who  is  here  represented  as  a  prince  in  his  nonage,  and  Time  as 
his  governor ;  and  the  author  begins  in  a  way  very  frequent  with 
him,  by  personating  other  writers,  who  sometimes  offer  such 
reasons  and  excuses  for  publishing  their  works,  as  they  ought 
chiefly  to  conceal  and  be  ashamed  of. 


32  Best  English  Essays 

committed,1  has  resolved  (as  I  am  told)  to  keep  you 
in  almost  a  universal  ignorance  of  our  studies, 
which  it  is  your  inherent  birth-right  to  inspect. 

It  is  amazing  to  me,  that  this  person  should  have 
assurance,  in  the  face  of  the  sun,  to  go  about  per- 
suading Your  Highness,  that  our  age  is  almost 
wholly  illiterate,  and  has  hardly  produced  one  writer 
upon  any  subject.  I  know  very  well,  that  when 
Your  Highness  shall  come  to  riper  years,  and  have 
gone  through  the  learning  of  antiquity,  you  will  be 
too  curious,  to  neglect  inquiring  into  the  authors  of 
the  very  age  before  you :  and  to  think  that  this  inso- 
lent, in  the  account  he  is  preparing  for  your  view, 
designs  to  reduce  them  to  a  number  so  insignificant 
as  I  am  ashamed  to  mention ;  it  moves  my  zeal  and 
my  spleen  for  the  honour  and  interest  of  our  vast 
flourishing  body,  as  well  as  of  myself,  for  whom,  I 
know  by  long  experience,  he  has  professed,  and  still 
continues,  a  peculiar  malice. 

'T  is  not  unlikely,  that,  when  Your  Highness  will 
one  day  peruse  what  I  am  now  writing,  you  may  be 
ready  to  expostulate  with  your  governor,  upon  the 
credit  of  what  I  here  affirm,  and  command  him  to 
show  you  some  of  our  productions.  To  which  he 
will  answer,  (for  I  am  well  informed  of  his  designs,) 
by  asking  Your  Highness,  where  they  are?  and 
what  is  become  of  them?  and  pretend  it  a  demon- 
stration that  there  never  were  any,  because  they  are 
not  then  to  be  found.  Not  to  be  found !  Who  has 
mislaid  them  ?  Are  they  sunk  in  the  abyss  of  things  ? 
'T  is  certain,  that  in  their  own  nature,  they  were 
light  enough  to  swim  upon  the  surface  for  all  eter- 
nity. Therefore  the  fault  is  in  him,  who  tied  weights 

1  Time,  allegorically  described  as  the  tutor  of  Posterity. 


Swift  33 

so  heavy  to  their  heels,  as  to  depress  them  to  the 
centre.  Is  their  very  essence  destroyed?  Who  has 
annihilated  them?  But,  that  it  may  no  longer  be  a 
doubt  with  Your  Highness,  who  is  to  be  the  author 
of  this  universal  ruin,  I  beseech  you  to  observe  that 
large  and  terrible  scythe  which  your  governor  af- 
fects to  bear  continually  about  him.  Be  pleased  to 
remark  the  length  and  strength,  the  sharpness  and 
hardness,  of  his  nails  and  teeth :  consider  his  bane- 
ful, abominable  breath,  enemy  to  life  and  matter, 
infectious  and  corrupting:  and  then  reflect,  whether 
it  be  possible,  for  any  mortal  ink  and  paper  of  this 
generation,  to  make  a  suitable  resistance.  O!  that 
Your  Highness  would  one  day  resolve  to  disarm 
this  usurping  maitre  du  palais  l  of  his  furious  en- 
gines, and  bring  your  empire  hors  de  page.2 

It  were  endless  to  recount  the  several  methods  of 
tyranny  and  destruction,  which  your  governor  is 
pleased  to  practise  upon  this  occasion.  His  inveter- 
ate malice  is  such  to  the  writings  of  our  age,  that  of 
several  thousands  produced  yearly  from  this  re- 
nowned city,  before  the  next  revolution  of  the  sun, 
there  is  not  one  to  be  heard  of:  Unhappy  infants! 
many  of  them  barbarously  destroyed,  before  they 
have  so  much  as  learnt  their  mother  tongue  to  beg 
for  pity.  Some  he  stifles  in  their  cradles ;  others 
he  frights  into  convulsions,  whereof  they  suddenly 
die  :  some  he  flays  alive ;  others  he  tears  limb  from 
limb.  Great  numbers  are  offered  to  Moloch;  and 

1  Comptroller.    The  kingdom  of  France  had  a  race  of  kings, 
which  they  call  les  rois faintans  (from  their  doing  nothing),  who  lived 
lazily  in  their  apartments,  while  the  kingdom  was  administered  by 
the  "  mayor  of  the  palace,"  till  Charles  Martel,  the  last  mayor,  put 
his  master  to  death,  and  took  the  kingdom  into  his  own  hand. 

2  Out  of  guardianship. 

3 


34  Best  English  Essays 

the  rest,  tainted  by  his  breath,  die  of  a  languishing 
consumption. 

But  the  concern  I  have  most  at  heart,  is  for  our 
corporation  of  poets ;  from  whom  I  am  preparing 
a  petition  to  Your  Highness,  to  be  subscribed  with 
the  names  of  one  hundred  and  thirty-six  of  the  first 
rate;  but  whose  immortal  productions  are  never 
likely  to  reach  your  eyes,  though  each  of  them  is 
now  an  humble  and  earnest  appellant  for  the  laurel, 
and  has  large  comely  volumes  ready  to  show,  for  a 
support  to  his  pretensions.  The  never-dying  works 
of  these  illustrious  persons,  your  governor,  sir,  has 
devoted  to  unavoidable  death ;  and  Your  Highness 
is  to  be  made  believe,  that  our  age  has  never  arrived 
at  the  honour  to  produce  one  single  poet. 

We  confess  Immortality  to  be  a  great  and  power- 
ful goddess ;  but  in  vain  we  offer  up  to  her  our 
devotions  and  our  sacrifices,  if  Your  Highness's 
governor,  who  has  usurped  the  priesthood,  must,  by 
an  unparalleled  ambition  and  avarice,  wholly  inter- 
cept and  devour  them. 

To  affirm  that  our  age  is  altogether  unlearned, 
and  devoid  of  writers  in  any  kind,  seems  to  be  an 
assertion  so  bold  and  so  false,  that  I  have  been  some 
time  thinking,  the  contrary  may  almost  be  proved 
by  uncontrollable  demonstration.  'T  is  true,  indeed, 
that  although  their  numbers  be  vast,  and  their  pro- 
ductions numerous  in  proportion,  yet  are  they  hur- 
ried so  hastily  off  the  scene,  that  they  escape  our 
memory,  and  elude  our  sight.  When  I  first  thought 
of  this  address,  I  had  prepared  a  copious  list  of 
titles  to  present  Your  Highness,  as  an  undisputed 
argument  for  what  I  affirm.  The  originals  were 
posted  fresh  upon  all  gates  and  corners  of  streets ; 


Swift  35 

but,  returning  in  a  very  few  hours  to  take  a  review, 
they  were  all  torn  down,  and  fresh  ones  in  their 
places.  I  inquired  after  them  among  readers  and 
booksellers;  but  I  inquired  in  vain;  the  memorial 
of  them  was  lost  among  men;  their  place  was  no 
more  to  be  found;  and  I  was  laughed  to  scorn  for 
a  clown  and  a  pedant,  without  all  taste  and  refine- 
ment, little  versed  in  the  course  of  present  affairs, 
and  that  knew  nothing  of  what  had  passed  in  the 
best  companies  of  court  and  town.  So  that  I  can 
only  avow  in  general  to  Your  Highness,  that  we  do 
abound  in  learning  and  wit;  but  to  fix  upon  par- 
ticulars, is  a  task  too  slippery  for  my  slender  abil- 
ities. If  I  should  venture  in  a  windy  day  to  affirm 
to  Your  Highness,  that  there  is  a  large  cloud  near 
the  horizon,  in  the  form  of  a  bear;  another  in  the 
zenith,  with  the  head  of  an  ass ;  a  third  to  the  west- 
ward, with  claws  like  a  dragon ;  and  Your  High- 
ness should  in  a  few  minutes  think  fit  to  examine 
the  truth,  it  is  certain  they  would  all  be  changed  in 
figure  and  position :  new  ones  would  arise,  and  all 
we  could  agree  upon  would  be,  that  clouds  there 
were,  but  that  I  was  grossly  mistaken  in  the  zoog- 
raphy  and  topography  of  them. 

But  your  governor  perhaps  may  still  insist,  and 
put  the  question,  —  What  is  then  become  of  those 
immense  bales  of  paper,  which  must  needs  have 
been  employed  in  such  numbers  of  books?  Can 
these  also  be  wholly  annihilate,  and  so  of  a  sud- 
den, as  I  pretend?  What  shall  I  say  in  return  of 
so  invidious  an  objection?  Books,  like  men  their 
authors,  have  no  more  than  one  way  of  coming  into 
the  world,  but  there  are  ten  thousand  to  go  out  of 
it,  and  return  no  more. 


36  Best  English  Essays 

I  profess  to  Your  Highness,  in  the  integrity  of 
my  heart,  that  what  I  am  going  to  say  is  literally 
true  this  minute  I  am  writing:  what  revolutions 
may  happen  before  it  shall  be  ready  for  your  pe- 
rusal, I  can  by  no  means  warrant :  however,  I  beg 
you  to  accept  it  as  a  specimen  of  our  learning,  our 
politeness,  and  our  wit.  I  do  therefore  affirm,  upon 
the  word  of  a  sincere  man,  that  there  is  now  actually 
in  being  a  certain  poet,  called  John  Dryden,  whose 
translation  of  Virgil  was  lately  printed  in  a  large 
folio,  well  bound,  and,  if  diligent  search  were  made, 
for  aught  I  know,  is  yet  to  be  seen.  There  is  an- 
other, called  Nahum  Tate,  who  is  ready  to  make 
oath,  that  he  has  caused  many  reams  of  verse  to  be 
published,  whereof  both  himself  and  his  bookseller, 
(if  lawfully  required,)  can  still  produce  authentic 
copies,  and  therefore  wonders  why  the  world  is 
pleased  to  make  such  a  secret  of  it.  There  is  a  third, 
known  by  the  name  of  Tom  Durfey,  a  poet  of  a  vast 
comprehension,  an  universal  genius,  and  most  pro- 
found learning.  There  are  also  one  Mr.  Rymer, 
and  one  Mr.  Dennis,  most  profound  critics.  There 
is  a  person  styled  Dr.  B — tl-y,  who  has  written  near 
a  thousand  pages  of  immense  erudition,  giving  a 
full  and  true  account  of  a  certain  squabble,  of  won- 
derful importance,  between  himself  and  a  book- 
seller: He  is  a  writer  of  infinite  wit  and  humour; 
no  man  rallies  with  a  better  grace,  and  in  more 
sprightly  turns.  Farther,  I  avow  to  Your  Highness, 
that  with  these  eyes  I  have  beheld  the  person  of 
William  W-tt-n,  B.D.,  who  has  written  a  good 
sizeable  volume  against  a  friend  of  your  governor,1 

1  Sir  William  Temple,  whose  praise  of  Phalaris's  Epistles 
brought  on  him  Bentley's  criticisms,  which  appeared  in  the 


Swift  37 

( from  whom,  alas !  he  must  therefore  look  for  little 
favour,)  in  a  most  gentlemanly  style,  adorned  with 
the  utmost  politeness  and  civility;  replete  with  dis- 
coveries equally  valuable  for  their  novelty  and  use; 
and  embellished  with  traits  of  wit,  so  poignant  and 
so  apposite,  that  he  is  a  worthy  yokemate  to  his 
fore-mentioned  friend. 

Why  should  I  go  upon  farther  particulars,  which 
might  fill  a  volume  with  the  just  eulogies  of  my 
contemporary  brethren  ?  I  shall  bequeath  this  piece 
of  justice  to  a  larger  work,  wherein  I  intend  to 
write  a  character  of  the  present  set  of  wits  in  our 
nation:  their  persons  I  shall  describe  particularly 
and  at  length,  their  genius  and  understandings  in 
miniature. 

In  the  meantime,  I  do  here  make  bold  to  present 
Your  Highness  with  a  faithful  abstract,  drawn  from 
the  universal  body  of  all  arts  and  sciences,  intended 
wholly  for  your  service  and  construction.  Nor  do  I 
doubt  in  the  least,  but  Your  Highness  will  peruse  it 
as  carefully,  and  make  as  considerable  improve- 
ments, as  other  young  princes  have  already  done, 
by  the  many  volumes  of  late  years  written  for  a  help 
to  their  studies.1 

That  Your  Highness  may  advance  in  wisdom  and 
virtue,  as  well  as  years,  and  at  last  outshine  all  your 
royal  ancestors,  shall  be  the  daily  prayer  of, 
Sir, 

Your  Highness's, 

Most  devoted,  &c. 

Decemb.  1697. 

second  edition  of  Wotton's  "  Reflections  on  Ancient  and  Modern 
Learning." 

1  There  were  innumerable  books  printed  for  the  use  of  the 
Dauphin  of  France. 


38  Best  English  Essays 


PREFACE 

'  I  VHE  wits  of  the  present  age  being  so  very 
JL  numerous  and  penetrating,  it  seems  the 
grandees  of  the  Church  and  State  begin  to  fall 
under  horrible  apprehensions  lest  these  gentlemen, 
during  intervals  of  a  long  peace,  should  find  leisure 
to  pick  holes  in  the  weak  sides  of  Religion  and  Gov- 
ernment. To  prevent  which,  there  has  been  much 
thought  employed  of  late  upon  certain  projects  for 
taking  off  the  force  and  edge  of  those  formidable 
inquirers  from  canvassing  and  reasoning  upon  such 
delicate  points.  They  have  at  length  fixed  upon  one, 
which  will  require  some  time  as  well  as  cost  to  per- 
fect. Meanwhile,  the  danger  hourly  increasing,  by 
new  levies  of  wits,  all  appointed  (as  there  is  reason 
to  fear)  with  pen,  ink,  and  paper,  which  may,  at  an 
hour's  warning,  be  drawn  out  into  pamphlets  and 
other  offensive  weapons  ready  for  immediate  exe- 
cution ;  it  was  judged  of  absolute  necessity  that 
some  present  expedient  be  thought  on,  till  the  main 
design  can  be  brought  to  maturity.  To  this  end  at 
a  grand  committee  some  days  ago,  this  important 
discovery  was  made  by  a  certain  curious  and  refined 
observer:  that  seamen  have  a  custom,  when  they 
meet  a  whale,  to  fling  him  out  an  empty  tub,  by  way 
of  amusement,  to  divert  him  from  laying  violent 
hands  upon  the  ship.  This  parable  was  immediately 
mythologized ;  the  whale  was  interpreted  to  be 
Hobbes's  "  Leviathan,"  which  tosses  and  plays  with 
all  schemes  of  religion  and  government,  whereof  a 
great  many  are  hollow  and  dry,  and  empty,  and 


Swift"  39 

noisy,  and  wooden,  and  given  to  rotation.  This  is 
the  Leviathan  from  whence  the  terrible  wits  of  our 
age  are  said  to  borrow  their  weapons.  The  ship  in 
danger  is  easily  understood  to  be  its  old  antitype  the 
commonwealth.  But  how  to  analyze  the  tub  was  a 
matter  of  difficulty;  when,  after  long  inquiry  and 
debate,  the  literal  meaning  was  preserved,  and  it 
was  decreed  that,  in  order  to  prevent  these  Levia- 
thans from  tossing  and  sporting  with  the  common- 
wealth (which  of  itself  is  too  apt  to  fluctuate),  they 
should  be  diverted  from  that  game  by  a  Tale  of  a 
Tub.  And  my  genius  being  conceived  to  lie  not 
unhappily  that  way,  I  had  the  honour  done  me  to  be 
engaged  in  the  performance. 


THE  THREE  BROTHERS  AND  THEIR  COATS 
[SECT.  II.] 

ONCE  upon  a  time,  there  was  a  man  who  had 
three  sons  by  one  wife,  and  all  at  a  birth, 
neither  could  the  midwife  tell  certainly,  which 
was  the  eldest.  Their  father  died  while  they  were 
young;  and  upon  his  deathbed,  calling  the  lads  to 
him,  spoke  thus : 

"  Sons ;  because  I  have  purchased  no  estate,  nor 
was  born  to  any,  I  have  long  considered  of  some 
good  legacies  to  bequeath  you ;  and  at  last,  with 
much  care,  as  well  as  expense,  have  provided  each  of 
you  (here  they  are)  a  new  coat.  Now,  you  are  to 
understand,  that  these  coats  have  two  virtues  con- 
tained in  them ;  one  is,  that  with  good  wearing,  they 
will  last  you  fresh  and  sound  as  long  as  you  live :  the 


40  Best  English  Essays 

other  is,  that  they  will  grow  in  the  same  proportion 
with  your  bodies,  lengthening  and  widening  of  them- 
selves, so  as  to  be  always  fit.  Here;  let  me  see 
them  on  you  before  I  die.  So ;  very  well ;  pray, 
children,  wear  them  clean,  and  brush  them  often. 
You  will  find  in  my  will1  (here  it  is)  full  instructions 
in  every  particular  concerning  the  wearing  and 
management  of  your  coats;  wherein  you  must  be 
very  exact,  to  avoid  the  penalties  I  have  appointed 
for  every  transgression  or  neglect,  upon  which  your 
future  fortunes  will  entirely  depend.  I  have  also 
commanded  in  my  will,  that  you  should  live  to- 
gether in  one  house  like  brethren  and  friends,  for 
then  you  will  be  sure  to  thrive,  and  not  otherwise." 

Here  the  story  says,  this  good  father  died,  and  the 
three  sons  went  all  together  to  seek  their  fortunes. 

I  shall  not  trouble  you  with  recounting  what  ad- 
ventures they  met  for  the  first  seven  years ; 2  any 
farther  than  by  taking  notice,  that  they  carefully 
observed  their  father's  will,  and  kept  their  coats  in 
very  good  order:  that  they  travelled  through  sev- 
eral countries,  encountered  a  reasonable  quantity  of 
giants,  and  slew  certain  dragons. 

Being  now  arrived  at  the  proper  age  for  produc- 
ing themselves,  they  came  up  to  town,  and  fell  in 
love  with  the  ladies,  but  especially  three,  who  about 
that  time  were  in  chief  reputation ;  the  Duchess 
d'Argent,  Madame  de  Grands  Titres,  and  the 
Countess  d'Orgueil.3  On  their  first  appearance, 
our  three  adventurers  met  with  a  very  bad  recep- 
tion ;  and  soon  with  great  sagacity  guessing  out  the 
reason,  they  quickly  began  to  improve  in  the  good 

1  The  New  Testament.  2  The  first  seven  centuries. 

8  Covetousness,  ambition,  and  pride. 


Swift  4 1 

qualities  of  the  town :  they  writ,  and  rallied,  and 
rhymed,  and  sung,  and  said,  and  said  nothing :  they 
drank,  and  fought,  and  slept,  and  swore,  and  took 
snuff:  they  went  to  new  plays  on  the  first  night, 
haunted  the  chocolate  houses,  beat  the  watch :  they 
bilked  hackney-coachmen,  ran  in  debt  with  shop- 
keepers: they  killed  bailiffs,  kicked  fiddlers  down 
stairs,  eat  at  Locket's, *  loitered  at  Will's : 2  they 
talked  of  the  drawing-room,  and  never  came  there: 
dined  with  lords  they  never  saw:  whispered  a 
duchess,  and  spoke  never  a  word :  exposed  the 
scrawls  of  their  laundress  for  billetdoux  of  quality : 
came  ever  just  from  court,  and  were  never  seen  in 
it:  attended  the  Levee  sub  dio:  got  a  list  of  peers 
by  heart  in  one  company,  and  with  great  familiarity 
retailed  them  in  another.  Above  all,  they  con- 
stantly attended  those  Committees  of  Senators,  who 
are  silent  in  the  House,  and  loud  in  the  coffee-house ; 
where  they  nightly  adjourn  to  chew  the  cud  of  poli- 
tics, and  are  encompassed  with  a  ring  of  disciples, 
who  lie  in  wait  to  catch  up  their  droppings.  The 
three  brothers  had  acquired  forty  other  qualifica- 
tions of  the  like  stamp,  too  tedious  to  recount,  and 
by  consequence,  were  justly  reckoned  the  most  ac- 
complished persons  in  the  town :  but  all  would  not 
suffice,  and  the  ladies  aforesaid  continued  still  in- 
flexible. To  clear  up  which  difficulty  I  must,  with 
the  reader's  good  leave  and  patience,  have  recourse 
to  some  points  of  weight,  which  the  authors  of  that 
age  have  not  sufficiently  illustrated. 

For,  about  this  time  it  happened  a  sect  arose, 

1  A  noted  tavern. 

2  Will's  coffee-house,  the  great  emporium  of  libels  and  scan- 
dals :  it  acquired  the  sobriquet  of  "  The  Wits'  Coffee-House." 


42  Best  English  Essays 

whose  tenets  obtained  and  spread  very  far,  especially 
in  the  grand  monde,  and  among  everybody  of  good 
fashion.  They  worshipped  a  sort  of  idol,1  who,  as 
their  doctrine  delivered,  did  daily  create  men  by  a 
kind  of  manufactory  operation.  This  idol  they 
placed  in  the  highest  parts  of  the  house,  on  an  altar 
erected  about  three  foot :  he  was  shown  in  the  pos- 
ture of  a  Persian  emperor,  sitting  on  a  superficies, 
with  his  legs  interwoven  under  him.  This  god  had 
a  goose  for  his  ensign :  whence  it  is  that  some 
learned  men  pretend  to  deduce  his  original  from 
Jupiter  Capitolinus.  At  his  left  hand,  beneath  the 
altar,  Hell  seemed  to  open,  and  catch  at  the  animals 
the  idol  was  creating;  to  prevent  which,  certain  of 
his  priests  hourly  flung  in  pieces  of  the  uninformed 
mass,  or  substance,  and  sometimes  whole  limbs  al- 
ready enlivened,  which  that  horrid  gulf  insatiably 
swallowed,  terrible  to  behold.  The  goose  was  also 
held  a  subaltern  divinity  or  deus  minorum  gentium, 
before  whose  shrine  was  sacrificed  that  creature, 
whose  hourly  food  is  human  gore,  and  who  is  in  so 
great  renown  abroad,  for  being  the  delight  and 
favourite  of  the  Egyptian  Cercopithecus.2  Millions 
of  these  animals  were  cruelly  slaughtered  every 
day,  to  appease  the  hunger  of  that  consuming  deity. 
The  chief  idol  was  also  worshipped  as  the  inventor 
of  the  yard  and  needle;  whether  as  the  god  of 
seamen,  or  on  account  of  certain  other  mystical 
attributes,  has  not  been  sufficiently  cleared. 

The  worshippers  of  this  deity  had  also  a  system 
of  their  belief,  which  seemed  to  turn  upon  the  fol- 

1  By  this  idol  is  meant  a  tailor. 

2  The   Egyptians   worshipped   a    monkey,   which   animal   is 
very  fond  of  eating  lice,  styled  here  creatures  that  feed  on  human 
gore. 


Swift  43 

lowing  fundamentals.  They  held  the  universe  to  be 
a  large  suit  of  clothes,  which  invests  everything: 
that  the  earth  is  invested  by  the  air;  the  air  is  in- 
vested by  the  stars ;  and  the  stars  are  invested  by 
the  primum  mobile.  Look  on  this  globe  of  earth, 
you  will  find  it  to  be  a  very  complete  and  fashion- 
able dress.  What  is  that  which  some  call  land,  but 
a  fine  coat  faced  with  green?  or  the  sea,  but  a 
waistcoat  of  water-tabby?  Proceed  to  the  particu- 
lar works  of  the  creation,  you  will  find  how  curi- 
ous journeyman  Nature  has  been,  to  trim  up  the 
vegetable  beaux;  observe  how  sparkish  a  periwig 
adorns  the  head  of  a  beech,  and  what  a  fine  doublet 
of  white  satin  is  worn  by  the  birch.  To  conclude 
from  all,  what  is  man  himself  but  a  micro-coat,1  or 
rather  a  complete  suit  of  clothes  with  all  its  trim- 
mings? As  to  his  body,  there  can  be  no  dispute: 
but  examine  even  the  acquirements  of  his  mind,  you 
will  find  them  all  contribute  in  their  order  towards 
furnishing  out  an  exact  dress :  to  instance  no  more ; 
is  not  religion  a  cloak ;  honesty  a  pair  of  shoes 
worn  out  in  the  dirt ;  self-love  a  surtout ;  vanity  a 
shirt ;  and  conscience  a  pair  of  breeches  ? 

These  postulata  being  admitted,  it  will  follow  in 
due  course  of  reasoning,  that  those  beings,  which 
the  world  calls  improperly  suits  of  clothes,  are  in 
reality  the  most  refined  species  of  animals;  or,  to 
proceed  higher,  that  they  are  rational  creatures,  or 
men.  For,  is  it  not  manifest,  that  they  live,  and 
move,  and  talk,  and  perform  all  other  offices  of 
human  life?  Are  not  beauty,  and  wit,  and  mien, 
and  breeding,  their  inseparable  proprieties?  In 

1  Alluding  to  the  word  microcosm,  or  a  little  world,  as  man 
has  been  called  by  philosophers. 


44  Best  English  Essays 

short,  we  see  nothing  but  them,  hear  nothing  but 
them.  Is  it  not  they  who  walk  the  streets,  fill  up 
parliament-,  coffee-,  play-houses  ?  'T  is  true,  in- 
deed, that  these  animals,  which  are  vulgarly  called 
suits  of  clothes,  or  dresses,  do,  according  to  certain 
compositions,  receive  different  appellations.  If  one 
of  them  be  trimmed  up  with  a  gold  chain,  and  a  red 
gown,  and  a  white  rod,  and  a  great  horse,  it  is  called 
a  Lord-Mayor:  if  certain  ermines  and  furs  be 
placed  in  a  certain  position,  we  style  them  a  Judge ; 
and  so  an  apt  conjunction  of  lawn  and  black  satin 
we  entitle  a  Bishop. 

Others  of  these  professors,  though  agreeing  in 
the  main  system,  were  yet  more  refined  upon  certain 
branches  of  it;  and  held,  that  man  was  an  animal 
compounded  of  two  dresses,  the  natural  and  celestial 
suit,  which  were  the  body  and  the  soul :  that  the 
soul  was  the  outward,  and  the  body  the  inward 
clothing;  that  the  latter  was  ex  traduce;  but  the 
former  of  daily  creation  and  circumfusion ;  this  last 
they  proved  by  scripture,  because  in  them  we  live, 
and  move,  and  have  our  being;  as  likewise  by  phi- 
losophy, because  they  are  all  in  all,  and  all  in  every 
part.  Besides,  said  they,  separate  these  two,  and 
you  will  find  the  body  to  be  only  a  senseless  un- 
savoury carcase.  By  all  which  it  is  manifest,  that 
the  outward  dress  must  needs  be  the  soul. 

To  this  system  of  religion,  were  tagged  several 
subaltern  doctrines,  which  were  entertained  with 
great  vogue;  as  particularly,  the  faculties  of  the 
mind  were  deduced  by  the  learned  among  them  in 
this  manner ;  embroidery,  was  sheer  wit ;  gold 
fringe,  was  agreeable  conversation ;  gold  lace,  was 
repartee;  a  huge  long  periwig,  was  humour;  and 


Swift  45 

a  coat  full  of  powder,  was  very  good  raillery :  all 
which  required  abundance  of  finesse  and  delicatesse 
to  manage  with  advantage,  as  well  as  a  strict  observ- 
ance after  times  and  fashions. 

I  have,  with  much  pains  and  reading,  collected 
out  of  ancient  authors,  this  short  summary  of  a  body 
of  philosophy  and  divinity,  which  seems  to  have 
been  composed  by  a  vein  and  race  of  thinking,  very 
different  from  any  other  systems  either  ancient  or 
modern.  And  it  was  not  merely  to  entertain  or  sat- 
isfy the  reader's  curiosity,  but  rather  to  give  him 
light  into  several  circumstances  of  the  following 
story;  that  knowing  the  state  of  dispositions  and 
opinions  in  an  age  so  remote,  he  may  better  compre- 
hend those  great  events,  which  were  the  issue  of 
them.  I  advise  therefore  the  courteous  reader  to 
peruse  with  a  world  of  application,  again  and  again, 
whatever  I  have  written  upon  this  matter.  And 
leaving  these  broken  ends,  I  carefully  gather  up  the 
chief  thread  of  my  story  and  proceed. 

These  opinions,  therefore,  were  so  universal,  as 
well  as  the  practices  of  them,  among  the  refined 
part  of  court  and  town,  that  our  three  brother- 
adventurers,  as  their  circumstances  then  stood,  were 
strangely  at  a  loss.  For,  on  the  one  side,  the  three 
ladies  they  addressed  themselves  to,  (whom  we  have 
named  already, )  were  at  the  very  top  of  the  fashion, 
and  abhorred  all  that  were  below  it  but  the  breadth 
of  a  hair.  On  the  other  side,  their  father's  will  was 
very  precise,  and  it  was  the  main  precept  in  it,  with 
the  greatest  penalties  annexed,  not  to  add  to,  or 
diminish  from  their  coats  one  thread,  without  a 
positive  command  in  the  will.  Now,  the  coats  their 
father  had  left  them  were,  't  is  true,  of  very  good 


46  Best  English  Essays 

cloth,  and,  besides,  so  neatly  sewn,  you  would  swear 
they  were  all  of  a  piece ;  but,  at  the  same  time,  very 
plain,  and  with  little  or  no  ornament:  and  it  hap- 
pened, that  before  they  were  a  month  in  town,  great 
shoulder-knots  came  up :  straight  all  the  world  was 
shoulder-knots ;  no  approaching  the  ladies'  ruelles 
without  the  quota  of  shoulder-knots.  That  fellow, 
cries  one,  has  no  soul ;  where  is  his  shoulder-knot  ? 
Our  three  brethren  soon  discovered  their  want  by 
sad  experience,  meeting  in  their  walks  with  forty 
mortifications  and  indignities.  If  they  went  to  the 
play-house,  the  door-keeper  showed  them  into  the 
twelve-penny  gallery.  If  they  called  a  boat,  says  a 
waterman,  I  am  first  sculler.  If  they  stepped  to 
the  Rose  to  take  a  bottle,  the  drawer  would  cry, 
Friend,  we  sell  no  ale.  If  they  went  to  visit  a  lady, 
a  footman  met  them  at  the  door,  with,  Pray  send 
up  your  message.  In  this  unhappy  case,  they  went 
immediately  to  consult  their  father's  will,  read  it 
over  and  over,  but  not  a  word  of  the  shoulder-knot. 
What  should  they  do?  What  temper  should  they 
find?  Obedience  was  absolutely  necessary,  and  yet 
shoulder-knots  appeared  extremely  requisite.  After 
much  thought,  one  of  the  brothers,  who  happened 
to  be  more  book-learned  than  the  other  two,  said, 
he  had  found  an  expedient.  'T  is  true,  said  he,  there 
is  nothing  here  in  this  will,  totidem  verbis,1  making 
mention  of  shoulder-knots:  but  I  dare  conjecture, 
we  may  find  them  inclusive,  or  totidem  syllabis.* 
This  distinction  was  immediately  approved  by  all; 
and  so  they  fell  again  to  examine  the  will.  But 
their  evil  star  had  so  directed  the  matter,  that  the 
first  syllable  was  not  to  be  found  in  the  whole  writ- 

1  In  so  many  words.  2  In  so  many  syllables. 


Swift  47 

ing.  Upon  which  disappointment,  he,  who  found 
the  former  evasion,  took  heart,  and  said,  "  Brothers, 
there  are  yet  hopes  ;  for  though  we  cannot  find  them 
totidem  verbis,  nor  totidem  syllabis,  I  dare  engage 
we  shall  make  them  out,  tertio  modo,1  or  totidem 
literis." 2  This  discovery  was  also  highly  com- 
mended, upon  which  they  fell  once  more  to  the 
scrutiny,  and  picked  out  S,H,O,U,L,D,E,R ;  when 
the  same  planet,  enemy  to  their  repose,  had  won- 
derfully contrived,  that  a  K  was  not  to  be  found. 
Here  was  a  weighty  difficulty !  But  the  distinguish- 
ing brother,  (for  whom  we  shall  hereafter  find  a 
name,)  now  his  hand  was  in,  proved  by  a  very  good 
argument,  that  K  was  a  modern,  illegitimate  letter, 
unknown  to  the  learned  ages,  nor  anywhere  to  be 
found  in  ancient  manuscripts.  "  'T  is  true,"  said 
he,  "  Calendas  hath  in  Q.V.C.3  been  sometimes  writ 
with  a  K,  but  erroneously ;  for,  in  the  best  copies, 
it  ever  spelt  with  a  C.  And,  by  consequence,  it 
was  a  gross  mistake  in  our  language  to  spell  '  knot ' 
with  a  K ; "  but  that  from  henceforward,  he  would 
take  care  it  should  be  writ  with  a  C.  Upon  this  all 
farther  difficulty  vanished;  shoulder-knots  were 
made  clearly  out  to  be  jure  paterno:  4  and  our  three 
gentlemen  swaggered  with  as  large  and  as  flaunting 
ones  as  the  best. 

But,  as  human  happiness  is  of  a  very  short  dura- 
tion, so  in  those  days  were  human  fashions,  upon 
which  it  entirely  depends.  Shoulder-knots  had  their 
time,  and  we  must  now  imagine  them  in  their  de- 

1  By  the  third  method. 

2  In  so  many  letters. 

8  Quibusdam  veteribus  codicibus ;  /.  e.  some  ancient  manu- 
scripts. 

4  According  to  the  Father's  will. 


48  Best  English  Essays 

cline;  for  a  certain  lord  came  just  from  Paris, 
with  fifty  yards  of  gold  lace  upon  his  coat,  exactly 
trimmed  after  the  court  fashion  of  that  month.  In 
two  days  all  mankind  appeared  closed  up  in  bars 
of  gold  lace:  whoever  durst  peep  abroad  without 
his  complement  of  gold  lace,  was  ill  received  among 
the  women.  What  should  our  three  knights  do 
in  this  momentous  affair?  They  had  sufficiently 
strained  a  point  already  in  the  affair  of  shoulder- 
knots.  Upon  recourse  to  the  will,  nothing  appeared 
there  but  altum  silentium.1  That  of  the  shoulder- 
knots  was  a  loose,  flying,  circumstantial  point ;  but 
this  of  gold  lace  seemed  too  considerable  an  alter- 
ation without  better  warrant.  It  did  aliquo  modo 
essentice  adhazrere,z  and  therefore  required  a  posi- 
tive precept.  But  about  this  time  it  fell  out,  that 
the  learned  brother  aforesaid  had  read  "  Aristotelis 
Dialectica"  and  especially  that  wonderful  piece  de 
Interpretatione,  which  has  the  faculty  of  teaching 
its  readers  to  find  out  a  meaning  in  everything  but 
itself,  like  commentators  on  the  Revelations,  who 
proceed  prophets  without  understanding  a  syllable 
of  the  text.  "  Brothers,"  said  he,  "  you  are  to  be 
informed,  that  of  wills  duo  sunt  genera,3  nuncupa- 
tory  4  and  scriptory ;  that  in  the  scriptory  will  here 
before  us,  there  is  no  precept  or  mention  about  gold 
lace,  conceditur: 6  but,  si  idem  afftrnietnr  de  nuncu- 
patorio,  ncgatur.6  For,  brothers,  if  you  remember, 

1  Profound  silence. 

2  Belong  in  a  way  to  the  essentials. 
8  There  are  two  kinds. 

*  By  this  is  meant  tradition,  allowed  by  the  Roman  Catholics 
to  have  equal  authority  with  the  scripture. 

5  It  is  conceded. 

6  If  the  same  be  affirmed  about  the  mmcupatory,  the  opposite 
is  true. 


Swift  49 

we  heard  a  fellow  say,  when  we  were  boys,  that  he 
heard  my  father's  man  say,  that  he  heard  my  father 
say,  that  he  would  advise  his  sons  to  get  gold  lace 
on  their  coats,  as  soon  as  ever  they  could  procure 
money  to  buy  it."  "  That  is  very  true,"  cries  the 
other ;  "  I  remember  it  perfectly  well,"  said  the 
third.  And  so  without  more  ado  got  the  largest 
gold  lace  in  the  parish,  and  walked  about  as  fine 
as  lords. 

A  while  after  there  came  up  all  in  fashion  a  pretty 
sort  of  flame-coloured  satin  for  linings;  and  the 
mercer  brought  a  pattern  of  it  immediately  to  our 
three  gentlemen :  "  An  please  your  worships,"  said 

he,  "  my  Lord  C and  Sir  J.  W.  had  linings  out 

of  this  very  piece  last  night;  it  takes  wonderfully, 
and  I  shall  not  have  a  remnant  left  enough  to  make 
my  wife  a  pin-cushion,  by  to-morrow  morning  at 
ten  o'clock."  Upon  this,  they  fell  again  to  rummage 
the  will,  because  the  present  case  also  required  a 
positive  precept,  the  lining  being  held  by  orthodox 
writers  to  be  of  the  essence  of  the  coat.  After  long 
search,  they  could  fix  upon  nothing  to  the  matter  in 
hand,  except  a  short  advice  of  their  father's  in  the 
will,  to  take  care  of  fire,  and  put  out  their  candles 
before  they  went  to  sleep.1  This,  though  a  good 
deal  for  the  purpose,  and  helping  very  far  towards 
self-conviction,  yet  not  seeming  wholly  of  force  to  es- 
tablish a  command ;  and  being  resolved  to  avoid  far- 
ther scruple,  as  well  as  future  occasion  for  scandal, 
says  he  that  was  the  scholar,  "  I  remember  to  have 
read  in  wills  of  a  codicil  annexed,  which  is  indeed 
a  part  of  the  will,  and  what  it  contains  hath  equal 

1  That  is,  to  take  care  of  hell ;  and,  in  order  to  do  that,  to 
subdue  and  extinguish  their  lusts. 

4 


50  Best  English  Essays 

authority  with  the  rest.  Now,  I  have  been  consid- 
ering of  this  same  will  here  before  us,  and  I  cannot 
reckon  it  to  be  complete  for  want  of  such  a  codicil : 
I  will  therefore  fasten  one  in  its  proper  place  very 
dexterously :  I  have  had  it  by  me  some  time ;  it  was 
written  by  a  dog-keeper  of  my  grandfather's  1  and 
talks  a  great  deal,  (as  good  luck  would  have  it,) 
of  this  very  flame-coloured  satin."  The  project  was 
immediately  approved  by  the  other  two;  an  old 
parchment  scroll  was  tagged  on  according  to  art,  in 
the  form  of  a  codicil  annexed,  and  the  satin  bought 
and  worn. 

Next  winter  a  player,  hired  for  the  purpose  by  the 
corporation  of  fringe-makers,  acted  his  part  in  a 
new  comedy,  all  covered  with  silver  fringe,  and, 
according  to  the  laudable  custom,  gave  rise  to  that 
fashion.  Upon  which  the  brothers,  consulting  their 
father's  will,  to  their  great  astonishment  found  these 
words ;  "  Item,  I  charge  and  command  my  said 
three  sons  to  wear  no  sort  of  silver  fringe  upon  or 
about  their  said  coats,"  etc.,  with  a  penalty,  in  case 
of  disobedience,  too  long  here  to  insert.  However, 
after  some  pause,  the  brother  so  often  mentioned 
for  his  erudition,  who  was  well  skilled  in  criticisms, 
had  found  in  a  certain  author,  which  he  said  should 
be  nameless,  that  the  same  word,  which,  in  the  will, 
is  called  fringe,  does  also  signify  a  broom-stick,  and 
doubtless  ought  to  have  the  same  interpretation  in 
this  paragraph.  This  another  of  the  brothers  dis- 
liked, because  of  that  epithet  silver,  which  could  not, 
he  humbly  conceived,  in  propriety  of  speech,  be 
reasonably  applied  to  a  broom-stick;  but  it  was 

1  This  refers  to  that  part  of  the  Apocrypha  where  mention  is 
made  of  Tobit  and  his  dog. 


Swift  5 1 

replied  upon  him,  that  his  epithet  was  understood  in 
a  mythological  and  allegorical  sense.  However,  he 
objected  again,  why  their  father  should  forbid  them 
to  wear  a  broom-stick  on  their  coats,  a  caution  that 
seemed  unnatural  and  impertinent;  upon  which  he 
was  taken  up  short,  as  one  who  spoke  irreverently 
of  a  mystery,  which  doubtless  was  very  useful  and 
significant,  but  ought  not  to  be  over-curiously  pried 
into,  or  nicely  reasoned  upon.  And,  in  short,  their 
father's  authority  being  now  considerably  sunk,  this 
expedient  was  allowed  to  serve  as  a  lawful  dispen- 
sation for  wearing  their  full  proportion  of  silver 
fringe. 

A  while  after  was  revived  an  old  fashion,  long 
antiquated,  of  embroidery  with  Indian  figures  of 
men,  women,  and  children.  Here  they  remembered 
but  too  well  how  their  father  had  always  abhorred 
this  fashion ;  that  he  made  several  paragraphs  on 
purpose,  importing  his  utter  detestation  of  it,  and 
bestowing  his  everlasting  curse  to  his  sons,  when- 
ever they  should  wear  it.  For  all  this,  in  a  few  days 
they  appeared  higher  in  the  fashion  than  anybody 
else  in  the  town.  But  they  solved  the  matter  by  say- 
ing, that  these  figures  were  not  at  all  the  same  with 
those  that  were  formerly  worn,  and  were  meant  in 
the  will.  Besides,  they  did  not  wear  them  in  the 
sense  as  forbidden  by  their  father;  but  as  they 
were  a  commendable  custom,  and  of  great  use  to 
the  public.  That  these  rigorous  clauses  in  the  will 
did  therefore  require  some  allowance,  and  a  fa- 
vourable interpretation,  and  ought  to  be  understood 
cum  grano  salis.1 

But  fashions  perpetually  altering  in  that  age,  the 

1  With  a  grain  of  salt. 


52  Best  English  Essays 

scholastic  brother  grew  weary  of  searching  farther 
evasions,  and  solving  everlasting  contradictions. 
Resolved,  therefore,  at  all  hazards,  to  comply  with 
the  modes  of  the  world,  they  concerted  matters  to- 
gether, and  agreed  unanimously  to  lock  up  their 
father's  will  in  a  strong  box,  brought  out  of  Greece 
or  Italy,  (I  have  forgot  which,)  and  trouble  them- 
selves no  farther  to  examine  it,  but  only  refer  to  its 
authority  whenever  they  thought  fit.  In  conse- 
quence whereof,  a  while  after  it  grew  a  general 
mode  to  wear  an  infinite  number  of  points,  most  of 
them  tagged  with  silver:  upon  which,  the  scholar 
pronounced  ex  cathedra,  that  points  were  absolutely 
jure  paterno,  as  they  might  very  well  remember. 
'T  is  true,  indeed,  the  fashion  prescribed  somewhat 
more  than  were  directly  named  in  the  will;  how- 
ever, that  they,  as  heirs-general  of  their  father,  had 
power  to  make  and  add  certain  clauses  for  public 
emolument,  though  not  deducible,  totidem  verbis, 
from  the  letter  of  the  will,  or  else  multa  absurda 
sequerentur.1  This  was  understood  for  canonical, 
and  therefore,  on  the  following  Sunday,  they  came 
to  church  all  covered  with  points. 

1  Many  absurdities  would  follow. 


Ill 

ADDISON 


ADDISON: 
FIRST   OF   THE    HUMORISTS 

THE  English  essay  as  represented  by 
Bacon  and  Swift  was  based  on  purely 
classic  models,  as  far  as  its  literary  style 
is  concerned,  and  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  advent 
of  Steele  and  Addison  there  might  never  have 
been  such  a  thing  as  the  distinctive  English  essay. 
Though  it  is  hardly  safe  to  call  anything  original, 
we  may  be  permitted,  perhaps,  to  consider  the 
style  of  writing  represented  in  the  "  Spectator  " 
as  a  peculiarly  English  development.  Of  course 
there  was  Montaigne;  but  Addison  would  have 
been  what  he  is  even  if  Montaigne  had  never 
existed. 

It  seems  hard  for  Richard  Steele  that  while  he 
is  the  acknowledged  inventor  of  the  gossipy  paper 
about  town  humors,  his  friend  Addison  has  got- 
ten all  the  glory.  The  fact  is,  in  itself  the  style 
of  Steele  is  more  fascinating  than  Addison' s  even 
to  us  to-day,  and  if  essays  were  to  be  selected  for 
their  style  alone,  some  of  Steele' s  would  have  to 
be  included.  But  you  may  search  the  "  Tatler," 
the  "  Spectator,"  and  the  "  Guardian  "  from  end 
to  end,  and  every  paper  whose  subject  seems  to 


56  Best  English  Essays 

make  it  worth  preserving  as  part  of  a  permanent 
literature  turns  out  to  be  Addison's.  Steele  was 
a  good  journalist,  and  as  a  retailer  of  current 
gossip  he  was  excellent ;  but  it  was  Addison  who 
raised  his  gossip  to  the  plane  of  universal  interest. 

We  have  already  pointed  out  the  fact  that  the 
"  Spectator  "  was  in  reality  a  sort  of  printed  let- 
ter, received  every  morning  by  the  people  of  the 
town  and  read  with  their  other  letters.  Its  sub- 
ject was  naturally  the  little  things  of  life,  the 
humors  of  life,  and  its  charm  lay  in  its  humor. 
It  is  characteristically  English,  and  no  other  style 
has  had  such  a  widespread  influence  on  English 
writers.  Johnson  and  Goldsmith  adopted  it; 
Johnson  not  quite  successfully,  Goldsmith  with 
surpassing  success  in  his  novel  "  The  Vicar  of 
Wakefield."  Charles  Lamb  was  a  lineal  literary 
descendant  of  Addison,  and  as  far  as  his  style 
is  concerned,  so  was  Thackeray.  Without  ques- 
tion Lamb  and  Thackeray  both  surpassed  their 
original. 

Because  of  the  debt  that  so  many  great  writers 
owe  to  Addison,  he  has  been  extravagantly 
praised  by  them,  and  the  echo  of  their  mighty 
words  is  still  reverberating.  In  his  "  Primer  of 
English  Literature,"  so  eminent  a  critic  as  Stop- 
ford  Brooke,  after  justly  describing  Addison's 
"  fine  and  tender  "  humor,  declares  of  his  style 
that  "  in  its  varied  cadence  and  subtle  ease  it  has 
never  been  surpassed."  "  This,"  says  Matthew 
Arnold,  "  seems  to  me  to  be  going  a  little  too 


Addison  57 

far.  One  could  not  say  more  of  Plato's.  What- 
ever his  services  to  his  time,  Addison  is  for  us 
now  a  writer  whose  range  and  force  of  thought 
are  not  considerable  enough  to  make  him  in- 
teresting; and  his  style  cannot  equal  in  varied 
cadence  and  subtle  ease  the  style  of  a  man 
like  Plato,  because  without  range  and  force  of 
thought  all  resources  of  style,  whether  in  cadence 
or  in  subtlety,  are  not  and  cannot  be  brought 
out."  Arnold  might  also  have  pointed  to  the  two 
English  writers  who  have  surpassed  Addison  on 
his  own  ground.  The  hero  of  the  "  Spectator  " 
is  of  interest  to  us  because  he  is  the  first  of  the 
humorists,  and  because  his  essays,  lacking  the 
subtlety  of  later  writers,  are  simpler  models  for 
our  study.  Franklin  found  in  them  excellent 
exercises  for  the  beginner  in  composition,  and  to 
this  day  none  better  have  been  found. 


SIR   ROGER   DE   COVERLEY   IN    THE 
COUNTRY 

SIR  ROGER  AT  HOME 

HAVING  often  received  an  invitation  from  my 
friend  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  to  pass  away  a 
month  with  him  in  the  country,  I  last  week  accom- 
panied him  thither,  and  am  settled  with  him  for 
some  time  at  his  country-house,  where  I  intend  to 
form  several  of  my  ensuing  speculations.  Sir 
Roger,  who  is  very  well  acquainted  with  my  humour, 


58  Best  English  Essays 

lets  me  rise  and  go  to  bed  when  I  please ;  dine  at 
his  own  table,  or  in  my  chamber,  as  I  think  fit ;  sit 
still,  and  say  nothing,  without  bidding  me  be  merry. 
When  the  gentlemen  of  the  country  come  to  see 
him,  he  only  shows  me  at  a  distance.  As  I  have 
been  walking  in  his  fields,  I  have  observed  them 
stealing  a  sight  of  me  over  an  hedge,  and  have 
heard  the  knight  desiring  them  not  to  let  me  see 
them,  for  that  I  hated  to  be  stared  at. 

I  am.  the  more  at  ease  in  Sir  Roger's  family, 
because  it  consists  of  sober  and  staid  persons;  for 
as  the  knight  is  the  best  master  in  the  world,  he 
seldom  changes  his  servants;  and  as  he  is  beloved 
by  all  about  him,  his  servants  never  care  for  leaving 
him :  by  this  means  his  domestics  are  all  in  years, 
and  grown  old  with  their  master.  You  would  take 
his  valet  de  chambre  for  his  brother;  his  butler  is 
gray-headed ;  his  groom  is  one  of  the  gravest  men 
that  I  have  ever  seen ;  and  his  coachman  has  the 
looks  of  a  privy-councillor.  You  see  the  goodness 
of  the  master  even  in  the  old  house-dog;  and  in  a 
gray  pad,  that  is  kept  in  the  stable  with  great  care 
and  tenderness  out  of  regard  to  his  past  services, 
though  he  has  been  useless  for  several  years. 

I  could  not  but  observe  with  a  great  deal  of  pleas- 
ure, the  joy  that  appeared  in  the  countenances  of 
these  ancient  domestics  upon  my  friend's  arrival  at 
his  country-seat.  Some  of  them  could  not  refrain 
from  tears  at  the  sight  of  their  old  master;  every 
one  of  them  pressed  forward  to  do  something  for 
him,  and  seemed  discouraged  if  they  were  not  em- 
ployed. At  the  same  time  the  good  old  knight,  with 
a  mixture  of  the  father  and  the  master  of  the  family, 
tempered  the  inquiries  after  his  own  affairs  with 


Addison  59 

several  kind  questions  relating  to  themselves.  This 
humanity  and  good-nature  engages  everybody  to 
him,  so  that  when  he  is  pleasant  upon  any  of  them, 
all  his  family  are  in  good  humour,  and  none  so  much 
as  the  person  whom  he  diverts  himself  with  :  on  the 
contrary,  if  he  coughs,  or  betrays  any  infirmity  of 
old  age,  it  is  easy  for  a  stander-by  to  observe  a 
secret  concern  in  the  looks  of  all  his  servants. 

My  worthy  friend  has  put  me  under  the  particular 
care  of  his  butler,  who  is  a  very  prudent  man,  and, 
as  well  as  the  rest  of  his  fellow-servants,  wonder- 
fully desirous  of  pleasing  me,  because  they  have 
often  heard  their  master  talk  of  me  as  of  his  par- 
ticular friend. 

My  chief  companion,  when  Sir  Roger  is  diverting 
himself  in  the  woods  or  the  fields,  is  a  very  vener- 
able man,  who  is  ever  with  Sir  Roger,  and  has  lived 
at  his  house  in  the  nature  of  a  chaplain  above  thirty 
years.  This  gentleman  is  a  person  of  good  sense, 
and  some  learning,  of  a  very  regular  life,  and  oblig- 
ing conversation:  he  heartily  loves  Sir  Roger,  and 
knows  that  he  is  very  much  in  the  old  knight's  es- 
teem ;  so  that  he  lives  in  the  family  rather  as  a 
relation  than  a  dependant. 

I  have  observed  in  several  of  my  papers,  that  my 
friend  Sir  Roger,  amidst  all  his  good  qualities,  is 
something  of  an  humourist ;  and  that  his  virtues,  as 
well  as  imperfections,  are,  as  it  were,  tinged  by  a 
certain  extravagance,  which  makes  them  particu- 
larly his,  and  distinguishes  them  from  those  of  other 
men.  This  cast  of  mind,  as  it  is  generally  very 
innocent  in  itself,  so  it  renders  his  conversation 
highly  agreeable,  and  more  delightful  than  the  same 
degree  of  sense  and  virtue  would  appear  in  their 


60  Best  English  Essays 

common  and  ordinary  colours.  As  I  was  walking 
with  him  last  night,  he  asked  me  how  I  liked  the 
good  man  whom  I  have  just  now  mentioned ;  and, 
without  staying  for  my  answer,  told  me,  that  he 
was  afraid  of  being  insulted  with  Latin  and  Greek  at 
his  own  table;  for  which  reason,  he  desired  a  par- 
ticular friend  of  his  at  the  University,  to  find  him 
out  a  clergyman  rather  of  plain  sense  than  much 
learning,  of  a  good  aspect,  a  clear  voice,  a  sociable 
temper,  and,  if  possible,  a  man  that  understood  a 
little  of  backgammon.  My  friend  (says  Sir  Roger) 
found  me  out  this  gentleman,  who,  besides  the  en- 
dowments required  of  him,  is,  they  tell  me,  a  good 
scholar,  though  he  does  not  show  it.  I  have  given 
him  the  parsonage  of  the  parish;  and  because  I 
know  his  value,  have  settled  upon  him  a  good  an- 
nuity for  life.  If  he  outlives  me,  he  shall  find  that 
he  was  higher  in  my  esteem  than  perhaps  he  thinks 
he  is.  He  has  now  been  with  me  thirty  years ;  and, 
though  he  does  not  know  I  have  taken  notice  of  it, 
has  never  in  all  that  time  asked  anything  of  me  for 
himself,  though  he  is  every  day  soliciting  me  for 
something  in  behalf  of  one  or  other  of  my  tenants, 
his  parishioners.  There  has  not  been  a  lawsuit  in 
the  parish  since  he  has  lived  among  them:  if  any 
dispute  arises,  they  apply  themselves  to  him  for  the 
decision;  if  they  do  not  acquiesce  in  his  judgment, 
which  I  think  never  happened  above  once,  or  twice 
at  most,  they  appeal  to  me.  At  his  first  settling  with 
me,  I  made  him  a  present  of  all  the  good  sermons 
which  have  been  printed  in  English,  and  only  begged 
of  him  that  every  Sunday  he  would  pronounce  one 
of  them  in  the  pulpit.  Accordingly,  he  has  digested 
them  into  such  a  series,  that  they  follow  one  another 


Addison  61 

naturally,  and  make  a  continued  system  of  practical 
divinity. 

As  Sir  Roger  was  going  on  in  his  story,  the 
gentleman  we  were  talking  of  came  up  to  us ;  and 
upon  the  knight's  asking  him  who  preached  to- 
morrow (for  it  was  Saturday  night),  told  us,  the 
Bishop  of  St.  Asaph  in  the  morning,  and  Dr.  South 
in  the  afternoon.  He  then  showed  us  his  list  of 
preachers  for  the  whole  year,  where  I  saw  with  a 
great  deal  of  pleasure,  Archbishop  Tillotson,  Bishop 
Saunderson,  Doctor  Barrow,  Doctor  Calamy,  with 
several  living  authors  who  have  published  dis- 
courses of  practical  divinity.  I  no  sooner  saw  this 
venerable  man  in  the  pulpit,  but  I  very  much  ap- 
proved of  my  friend's  insisting  upon  the  qualifica- 
tions of  a  good  aspect  and  a  clear  voice ;  for  I  was 
so  charmed  with  the  gracefulness  of  his  figure  and 
delivery,  as  well  as  the  discourses  he  pronounced, 
that  I  think  I  never  passed  any  time  more  to  my 
satisfaction.  A  sermon  repeated  after  this  manner, 
is  like  the  composition  of  a  poet  in  the  mouth  of  a 
graceful  actor. 

I  could  heartily  wish  that  more  of  our  country 
clergy  would  follow  this  example,  and,  instead  of 
wasting  their  spirits  in  laborious  compositions  of 
their  own,  would  endeavour  after  a  handsome  elo- 
cution, and  all  those  other  talents  that  are  proper  to 
enforce  what  has  been  penned  by  greater  masters. 
This  would  not  only  be  more  easy  to  themselves, 
but  more  edifying  to  the  people. 


62  Best  English  Essays 


SIR  ROGER  AND  WILL  WIMBLE 

AS  I  was  yesterday  morning  walking  with  Sir 
Roger  before  his  house,  a  country  fellow 
brought  him  a  huge  fish,  which,  he  told  him,  Mr. 
William  Wimble  had  caught  that  very  morning; 
and  that  he  presented  it  with  his  service  to  him,  and 
intended  to  come  and  dine  with  him.  At  the  same 
time  he  delivered  a  letter,  which  my  friend  read  to 
me  as  soon  as  the  messenger  left  him. 

"  Sir  ROGER,  —  I  desire  you  to  accept  of  a  Jack, 
which  is  the  best  I  have  caught  this  season.  I  in- 
tend to  come  and  stay  with  you  a  week,  and  see 
how  the  Perch  bite  in  the  Black  river.  I  observed 
with  some  concern,  the  last  time  I  saw  you  upon  the 
Bowling-green,  that  your  whip  wanted  a  lash  to  it : 
I  will  bring  half  a  dozen  with  me  that  I  twisted  last 
week  which  I  hope  will  serve  you  all  the  time  you 
are  in  the  country.  I  have  not  been  out  of  the  saddle 
for  six  days  last  past,  having  been  at  Eaton  with 
Sir  John's  eldest  son.  He  takes  to  his  learning 
hugely. 

"  I  am,  Sir,  your  humble  Servant, 

"WILL  WIMBLE." 

This  extraordinary  letter,  and  message  that  ac- 
companied it,  made  me  very  curious  to  know  the 
character  and  quality  of  the  gentleman  who  sent 
them;  which  I  found  to  be  as  follows.  Will 
Wimble  is  younger  brother  to  a  baronet,  and  de- 
scended of  the  ancient  family  of  the  Wimbles.  He 
is  now  between  forty  and  fifty;  but  being  bred  to 


Addison  63 

no  business,  and  born  to  no  estate,  he  generally  lives 
with  his  elder  brother  as  superintendent  of  his 
game.  He  hunts  a  pack  of  dogs  better  than  any 
man  in  the  country,  and  is  very  famous  for  finding 
out  a  hare.  He  is  extremely  well  versed  in  all  the 
little  handicrafts  of  an  idle  man :  he  makes  a  May- 
fly to  a  miracle;  and  furnishes  the  whole  country 
with  angle-rods.  As  he  is  a  good-natured,  officious 
fellow,  and  very  much  esteemed  upon  account  of 
his.  family,  he  is  a  welcome  guest  at  every  house, 
and  keeps  up  a  good  correspondence  among  all  the 
gentlemen  about  him.  He  carries  a  tulip  root  in 
his  pocket  from  one  to  another,  or  exchanges  a 
puppy  between  a  couple  of  friends  that  live  perhaps 
in  the  opposite  sides  of  the  county.  Will  is  a  par- 
ticular favourite  of  all  the  young  heirs,  whom  he 
frequently  obliges  with  a  net  that  he  has  weaved,  or 
a  setting-dog  that  he  has  made  himself ;  he  now  and 
then  presents  a  pair  of  garters  of  his  own  knitting 
to  their  mothers  or  sisters ;  and  raises  a  great  deal 
of  mirth  among  them,  by  inquiring,  as  often  as  he 
meets  them,  "  how  they  wear  ?  "  These  gentleman- 
like manufactures,  and  obliging  little  humours,  make 
Will  the  darling  of  the  country. 

Sir  Roger  was  proceeding  in  the  character  of  him, 
when  he  saw  him  make  up  to  us  with  two  or  three 
hazel-twigs  in  his  hand,  that  he  had  cut  in  Sir 
Roger's  woods,  as  he  came  through  them  in  his  way 
to  the  house.  I  was  very  much  pleased  to  observe 
on  one  side  the  hearty  and  sincere  welcome  with 
which  Sir  Roger  received  him,  and  on  the  other, 
the  secret  joy  which  his  guest  discovered  at  sight  of 
the  good  old  knight.  After  the  first  salutes  were 
over,  Will  desired  Sir  Roger  to  lend  him  one  of  his 


64  Best  English  Essays 

servants  to  carry  a  set  of  shuttlecocks,  he  had  with 
him  in  a  little  box,  to  a  lady  that  lived  about  a  mile 
off,  to  whom  it  seems  he  had  promised  such  a  pres- 
ent for  above  this  half-year.  Sir  Roger's  back  was 
no  sooner  turned,  but  honest  Will  began  to  tell  me 
of  a  large  cock  pheasant  that  he  had  sprung  in  one 
of  the  neighbouring  woods,  with  two  or  three  other 
adventures  of  the  same  nature.  Odd  and  uncom- 
mon characters  are  the  game  that  I  look  for,  and 
most  delight  in ;  for  which  reason  I  was  as  much 
pleased  with  the  novelty  of  the  person  that  talked  to 
me,  as  he  could  be  for  his  life  with  the  springing  of 
a  pheasant,  and  therefore  listened  to  him  with  more 
than  ordinary  attention. 

In  the  midst  of  his  discourse  the  bell  rung  to  din- 
ner, where  the  gentleman  I  have  been  speaking  of 
had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  huge  Jack,  he  had 
caught,  served  up  for  the  first  dish  in  a  most  sump- 
tuous manner.  Upon  our  sitting  down  to  it,  he 
gave  us  a  long  actount  how  he  had  hooked  it,  played 
with  it,  foiled  it,  and  at  length  drew  it  out  upon  the 
bank,  with  several  other  particulars,  that  lasted  all 
the  first  course.  A  .dish  of  wild  fowl,  that  came 
afterwards,  furnished  conversation  for  the  rest  of 
the  dinner,  which  concluded  with  a  late  invention  of 
Will's  for  improving  the  quail-pipe. 

Upon  withdrawing  into  my  room  after  dinner, 
I  was  secretly  touched  with  compassion  towards  the 
honest  gentleman  that  had  dined  with  us ;  and  could 
not  but  consider,  with  a  great  deal  of  concern,  how 
so  good  an  heart,  and  such  busy  hands,  were  wholly 
employed  in  trifles ;  that  so  much  humanity  should 
be  so  little  beneficial  to  others,  and  so  much  industry 
so  little  advantageous  to  himself.  The  same  temper 


Addison  65 

of  mind,  and  application  to  affairs,  might  have 
recommended  him  to  the  public  esteem,  and  have 
raised  his  fortune  in  another  station  of  life.  What 
good  to  his  country,  or  himself,  might  not  a  trader 
or  merchant  have  done  with  such  useful,  though 
ordinary,  qualifications  ? 

Will  Wimble's  is  the  case  of  many  a  younger 
brother  of  a  great  family,  who  had  rather  see  their 
children  starve  like  gentlemen,  than  thrive  in  a 
trade  or  profession  that  is  beneath  their  quality. 
This  humour  fills  several  parts  of  Europe  with  pride 
and  beggary.  It  is  the  happiness  of  a  trading 
nation,  like  ours,  that  the  younger  sons,  though 
incapable  of  any  liberal  art  or  profession,  may  be 
placed  in  such  a  way  of  life,  as  may  perhaps  enable 
them  to  vie  with  the  best  of  their  family :  accord- 
ingly, we  find  several  citizens  that  were  launched 
into  the  world  with  narrow  fortunes,  rising  by  an 
honest  industry  to  greater  estates  than  those  of  their 
elder  brothers.  It  is  not  improbable  but  Will  was 
formerly  tried  at  divinity,  law,  or  physic ;  and  that 
finding  his  genius  did  not  lie  that  way,  his  parents 
gave  him  up  at  length  to  his  own  inventions.  But 
certainly,  however  improper  he  might  have  been 
for  studies  of  a  higher  nature,  he  was  perfectly  well 
turned  for  the  occupations  of  trade  and  commerce. 


SIR  ROGER  AT  CHURCH    • 

I   AM  always  very  well  pleased  with  a  country 
Sunday ;  and  think,  if  keeping  holy  the  seventh 
day  were  only  a  human  institution,  it  would  be  the 
best  method  that  could  have  been  thought  of  for  the 

5 


66  Best  English  Essays 

polishing  and  civilising  of  mankind.  It  is  certain 
the  country-people  would  soon  degenerate  into  a 
kind  of  savages  and  barbarians,  were  there  not  such 
frequent  returns  of  a  stated  time,  in  which  the  whole 
village  meet  together  with  their  best  faces,  and  in 
their  cleanliest  habits,  to  converse  with  one  another 
upon  indifferent  subjects,  hear  their  duties  explained 
to  them,  and  join  together  in  adoration  of  the 
Supreme  Being.  Sunday  clears  away  the  rust  of 
the  whole  week,  not  only  as  it  refreshes  in  their 
minds  the  notions  of  religion,  but  as  it  puts  both 
the  sexes  upon  appearing  in  their  most  agreeable 
forms,  and  exerting  all  such  qualities  as  are  apt  to 
give  them  a  figure  in  the  eye  of  the  village.  A 
country-fellow  distinguishes  himself  as  much  in  the 
churchyard  as  a  citizen  does  upon  the  Change,  the 
whole  parish-politics  being  generally  discussed  in 
that  place  either  after  sermon  or  before  the  bell 
rings. 

My  friend  Sir  Roger,  being  a  good  churchman, 
has  beautified  the  inside  of  his  church  with  several 
texts  of  his  own  choosing;  he  has  likewise  given 
a  handsome  pulpit-cloth,  and  railed  in  the  com- 
munion-table at  his  own  expense.  He  has  often 
told  me,  that  at  his  coming  to  his  estate  he  found  his 
parishioners  very  irregular;  and  that  in  order  to 
make  them  kneel  and  join  in  the  responses,  he  gave 
every  one  of  them  a  hassock  and  a  Common-Prayer 
Book;  and  at  the  same  time  employed  an  itinerant 
singing-master,  who  goes  about  the  country  for  that 
purpose,  to  instruct  them  rightly  in  the  tunes  of  the 
psalms ;  upon  which  they  now  very  much  value 
themselves,  and  indeed  out-do  most  of  the  country 
churches  that  I  have  ever  heard. 


Addison  67 

As  Sir  Roger  is  landlord  to  the  whole  congrega- 
tion, he  keeps  them  in  very  good  order,  and  will 
suffer  nobody  to  sleep  in  it  besides  himself;  for  if 
by  chance  he  has  been  surprised  into  a  short  nap  at 
sermon,  upon  recovering  out  of  it  he  stands  up  and 
looks  about  him,  and  if  he  sees  anybody  else  nod- 
ding, either  wakes  them  himself,  or  sends  his  ser- 
vant to  them.  Several  other  of  the  old  knight's 
particularities  break  out  upon  these  occasions; 
sometimes  he  will  be  lengthening  out  a  verse  in  the 
singing-psalms,  half  a  minute  after  the  rest  of  the 
congregation  have  done  with  it;  sometimes,  when 
he  is  pleased  with  the  matter  of  his  devotion,  he 
pronounces  Amen  three  or  four  times  to  the  same 
prayer;  and  sometimes  stands  up  when  everybody 
else  is  upon  their  knees,  to  count  the  congregation, 
or  see  if  any  of  his  tenants  are  missing. 

I  was  yesterday  very  much  surprised  to  hear  my 
old  friend,  in  the  midst  of  the  service,  calling  out  to 
one  John  Matthews  to  mind  what  he  was  about,  and 
not  disturb  the  congregation.  This  John  Matthews, 
it  seems,  is  remarkable  for  being  an  idle  fellow,  and 
at  that  time  was  kicking  his  heels  for  his  diversion. 
This  authority  of  the  knight,  though  exerted  in  that 
odd  manner  which  accompanies  him  in  all  circum- 
stances of  life,  has  a  very  good  effect  upon  the 
parish,  who  are  not  polite  enough  to  see  anything 
ridiculous  in  his  behaviour ;  besides  that  the  general 
good  sense  and  worthiness  of  his  character,  make 
his  friends  observe  these  little  singularities  as  foils 
that  rather  set  off  than  blemish  his  good  qualities. 

As  soon  as  the  sermon  is  finished,  nobody  pre- 
sumes to  stir  till  Sir  Roger  is  gone  out  of  the  church. 
The  knight  walks  down  from  his  seat  in  the  chan- 


68  Best  English  Essays 

eel  between  a  double  row  of  his  tenants,  that  stand 
bowing"  to  him  on  each  side;  and  every  now  and 
then  he  inquires  how  such  an  one's  wife,  or  mother, 
or  son,  or  father  do,  whom  he  does  not  see  at 
church ;  which  is  understood  as  a  secret  reprimand 
to  the  person  that  is  absent. 

The  chaplain  has  often  told  me,  that  upon  a  cate- 
chising-day,  when  Sir  Roger  has  been  pleased  with 
a  boy  that  answers  well,  he  has  ordered  a  Bible  to 
be  given  him  next  day  for  his  encouragement ;  and 
sometimes  accompanies  it  with  a  flitch  of  bacon  to 
his  mother.  Sir  Roger  has  likewise  added  five 
pounds  a  year  to  the  clerk's  place ;  and  that  he  may 
encourage  the  young  fellows  to  make  themselves 
perfect  in  the  church-service,  has  promised,  upon 
the  death  of  the  present  incumbent,  who  is  very  old, 
to  bestow  it  according  to  merit. 

The  fair  understanding  between  Sir  Roger  and 
his  chaplain,  and  their  mutual  concurrence  in  doing 
good,  is  the  more  remarkable,  because  the  very  next 
village  is  famous  for  the  differences  and  conten- 
tions that  rise  between  the  parson  and  the  squire, 
who  live  in  a  perpetual  state  of  war.  The  parson 
is  always  at  the  squire,  and  the  squire,  to  be  re- 
venged on  the  parson,  never  comes  to  church.  The 
squire  has  made  all  his  tenants  atheists  and  tithe- 
stealers ;  while  the  parson  instructs  them  every 
Sunday  in  the  dignity  of  his  order,  and  insinuates 
to  them,  almost  in  every  sermon,  that  he  is  a  better 
man  than  his  patron.  In  short,  matters  are  come  to 
such  an  extremity,  that  the  squire  has  not  said  his 
prayers  either  in  public  or  private  this  half  year; 
and  that  the  parson  threatens  him,  if  he  does  not 
mend  his  manners,  to  pray  for  him  in  the  face  of 
the  whole  congregation. 


Addison  69 

Feuds  of  this  nature,  though  too  frequent  in  the 
country,  are  very  fatal  to  the  ordinary  people;  who 
are  so  used  to  be  dazzled  with  riches,  that  they  pay 
as  much  deference  to  the  understanding  of  a  man 
of  an  estate,  as  of  a  man  of  learning;  and  are  very 
hardly  brought  to  regard  any  truth,  how  important 
soever  it  may  be,  that  is  preached  to  them,  when 
they  know  there  are  several  men  of  five  hundred  a 
year  who  do  not  believe  it. 


THE    MAN    OF   THE   TOWN 

MY  friend  Will  Honeycomb  values  himself  very 
much  upon  what  he  calls  the  knowledge  of 
mankind,  which  has  cost  him  many  disasters  in  his 
youth;  for  Will  reckons  every  misfortune  that  he 
has  met  with  among  the  women,  and  every  ren- 
counter among  the  men,  as  parts  of  his  education, 
and  fancies  he  should  never  have  been  the  man  he 
is,  had  not  he  broke  windows,  knocked  down  con- 
stables, and  disturbed  honest  people  with  his  mid- 
night serenades,  when  he  was  a  young  fellow.  The 
engaging  in  adventures  of  this  nature  Will  calls  the 
studying  of  mankind;  and  terms  this  knowledge  of 
the  town,  the  knowledge  of  the  world.  Will  in- 
genuously confesses,  that  for  half  his  life  his  head 
ached  every  morning  with  reading  of  men  over- 
night; and  at  present  comforts  himself  under  cer- 
tain pains  which  he  endures  from  time  to  time,  that 
without  them  he  could  not  have  been  acquainted 
with  the  gallantries  of  the  age.  This  Will  looks 
upon  as  the  learning  of  a  gentleman,  and  regards 
all  other  kinds  of  science  as  the  accomplishments 


jo  Best  English  Essays 

of  one  whom  he  calls  a  scholar,  a  bookish  man,  or 
a  philosopher. 

For  these  reasons  Will  shines  in  mixed  company, 
where  he  has  the  discretion  not  to  go  out  of  his 
depth,  and  has  often  a  certain  way  of  making  his 
real  ignorance  appear  a  seeming  one.  Our  club, 
however,  has  frequently  caught  him  tripping,  at 
which  times  they  never  spare  him.  For  as  Will 
often  insults  us  with  the  knowledge  of  the  town, 
we  sometimes  take  our  revenge  upon  him  by  our 
knowledge  of  books. 

He  was  last  week  producing  two  or  three  letters 
which  he  writ  in  his  youth  to  a  coquette  lady.  The 
raillery  of  them  was  natural,  and  well  enough  for  a 
mere  man  of  the  town ;  but,  very  unluckily,  several 
of  the  words  were  wrong  spelt.  Will  laughed  this 
off  at  first  as  well  as  he  could,  but  finding  himself 
pushed  on  all  sides,  and  especially  by  the  templar, 
he  told  us,  with  a  little  passion,  that  he  never  liked 
pedantry  in  spelling,  and  that  he  spelt  like  a  gentle- 
man, and  not  like  a  scholar:  upon  this  Will  had 
recourse  to  his  old  topic  of  showing  the  narrow- 
spiritedness,  the  pride,  and  ignorance  of  pedants ; 
which  he  carried  so  far,  that  upon  my  retiring  to 
my  lodgings,  I  could  not  forbear  throwing  together 
such  reflections  as  occurred  to  me  upon  that  subject. 

A  man  who  has  been  brought  up  among  books, 
and  is  able  to  talk  of  nothing  else,  is  a  very  indiffer- 
ent companion,  and  what  we  call  a  pedant.  But, 
methinks,  we  should  enlarge  the  title,  and  give  it 
every  one  that  does  not  know  how  to  think  out  of 
his  profession,  and  particular  way  of  life. 

What  is  a  greater  pedant  than  a  mere  man  of  the 
town  ?  Bar  him  the  play-houses,  a  catalogue  of  the 


Addison  7 1 

reigning  beauties,  and  an  account  of  a  few  fashion- 
able distempers  that  have  befallen  him,  and  you 
strike  him  dumb.  How  many  a  pretty  gentleman's 
knowledge  lies  all  within  the  verge  of  the  court? 
He  will  tell  you  the  names  of  the  principal  favour- 
ites, repeat  the  shrewd  sayings  of  a  man  of  quality, 
whisper  an  intrigue  that  is  not  yet  blown  upon  by 
common  fame ;  or,  if  the  sphere  of  hi»  observations 
is  a  little  larger  than  ordinary,  will  perhaps  enter 
into  all  the  incidents,  turns,  and  revolutions  in  a 
game  of  ombre.  When  he  has  gone  thus  far,  he  has 
shown  you  the  whole  circle  of  his  accomplishments, 
his  parts  are  drained,  and  he  is  disabled  from  any 
further  conversation.  What  are  these  but  rank 
pedants  ?  and  yet  these  are  the  men  who  value  them- 
selves most  on  their  exemption  from  the  pedantry 
of  colleges. 

I  might  here  mention  the  military  pedant,  who 
always  talks  in  a  camp,  and  is  storming  towns, 
making  lodgments  and  fighting  battles  from  one  end 
of  the  year  to  the  other.  Everything  he  speaks 
smells  of  gunpowder ;  if  you  take  away  his  artillery 
from  him,  he  has  not  a  word  to  say  for  himself.  I 
might  likewise  mention  the  law  pedant,  that  is  per- 
petually putting  cases,  repeating  the  transactions 
of  Westminster  Hall,  wrangling  with  you  upon  the 
most  indifferent  circumstances  of  life,  and  not  to 
be  convinced  of  the  distance  of  a  place,  or  of  the 
most  trivial  point  in  conversation,  but  by  dint  of 
argument.  The  state  pedant  is  wrapped  up  in  news, 
and  lost  in  politics.  If  you  mention  either  of  the 
kings  of  Spain  or  Poland,  he  talks  very  notably; 
but  if  you  go  out  of  the  gazette  you  drop  him.  In 
short,  a  mere  courtier,  a  mere  soldier,  a  mere 


j2  Best  English  Essays 

scholar,  a  mere  anything,  is  an  insipid  pedantic 
character,  and  equally  ridiculous. 

Of  all  the  species  of  pedants,  which  I  have  men- 
tioned, the  book  pedant  is  much  the  most  support- 
able; he  has  at  least  an  exercised  understanding, 
and  a  head  which  is  full  though  confused,  so  that  a 
man  who  converses  with  him  may  often  receive 
from  him  hints  of  things  that  are  worth  knowing, 
and  what  he  may  possibly  turn  to  his  own  advan- 
tage, though  they  are  of  little  use  to  the  owner. 
The  worst  kind  of  pedants  among  learned  men,  are 
such  as  are  naturally  endowed  with  a  very  small 
share  of  common  sense,  and  have  read  a  great 
number  of  books  without  taste  or  distinction. 

The  truth  of  it  is,  learning,  like  travelling,  and  all 
other  methods  of  improvement,  as  it  finishes  good 
sense,  so  it  makes  a  silly  man  ten  thousand  times 
more  insufferable,  by  supplying  variety  of  matter 
to  his  impertinence,  and  giving  him  an  opportunity 
of  abounding  in  absurdities. 


THE    FAN    EXERCISE 

I  DO  not  know  whether  to  call  the  following 
letter  a  satire  upon  coquettes,  or  a  representa- 
tion of  their  several  fantastical  accomplishments,  or 
what  other  title  to  give  it ;  but  as  it  is  I  shall  com- 
municate it  to  the  public.  It  will  sufficiently  explain 
its  own  intentions,  so  that  I  shall  give  it  my  reader 
at  length,  without  either  preface  or  postscript. 

"  MR.    SPECTATOR,  —  Women    are    armed    with 
fans  as  men  with  swords,  and  sometimes  do  more 


Addison  73 

execution  with  them.  To  the  end,  therefore,  that 
ladies  may  be  entire  mistresses  of  the  weapon  which 
they  bear,  I  have  erected  an  Academy  for  the  train- 
ing up  of  young  women  in  the  Exercise  of  the  Fan, 
according  to  the  most  fashionable  airs  and  motions 
that  are  now  practised  at  court.  The  ladies  who 
carry  fans  under  me  are  drawn  up  twice  a  day  in 
my  great  hall,  where  they  are  instructed  in  the  use 
of  their  arms,  and  exercised  by  the  following  words 
of  command : 

Handle  your  Fans, 
Unfurl  your  Fans, 
Discharge  your  Fans, 
Ground  your  Fans, 
Recover  your  Fans, 
Flutter  your  Fans. 

By  the  right  observation  of  these  few  plain  words 
of  command,  a  woman  of  a  tolerable  genius  who 
will  apply  herself  diligently  to  her  exercise  for  the 
space  of  one  half  year,  shall  be  able  to  give  her 
fan  all  the  graces  that  can  possibly  enter  into  that 
little  modish  machine. 

"  But  to  the  end  that  my  readers  may  form  to 
themselves  a  right  notion  of  this  exercise,  I  beg 
leave  to  explain  it  to  them  in  all  its  parts.  When 
my  female  regiment  is  drawn  up  in  array,  with 
every  one  her  weapon  in  her  hand,  upon  my  giving 
the  word  to  Handle  their  Fans,  each  of  them  shakes 
her  fan  at  me  with  a  smile,  then  gives  her  right- 
hand  woman  a  tap  upon  the  shoulder,  then  presses 
her  lips  with  the  extremity  of  her  fan,  then  lets  her 
arms  fall  in  an  easy  motion,  and  stands  in  readiness 
to  receive  the  next  word  of  command.  All  this  is 
done  with  a  close  fan,  and  is  generally  learned  in 
the  first  week.  ••* 


74  Best  English  Essays 

"  The  next  motion  is  that  of  Unfurling  the  Fan, 
in  which  are  comprehended  several  little  flirts  and 
vibrations,  as  also  gradual  and  deliberate  openings, 
with  many  voluntary  fallings  asunder  in  the  fan 
itself,  that  are  seldom  learned  under  a  month's  prac- 
tice. This  part  of  the  exercise  pleases  the  specta- 
tors more  than  any  other,  as  it  discovers  on  a  sudden 
an  infinite  number  of  Cupids,  garlands,  altars,  birds, 
beasts,  rainbows,  and  the  like  agreeable  figures,  that 
display  themselves  to  view,  whilst  every  one  in  the 
regiment  holds  a  picture  in  her  hand. 

"  Upon  my  giving  the  word  to  Discharge  their 
Fans,  they  give  one  general  crack,  that  may  be 
heard  at  a  considerable  distance  when  the  wind  sits 
fair.  This  is  one  of  the  most  difficult  parts  of  the 
exercise ;  but  I  have  several  ladies  \vith  me,  who  at 
their  first  entrance  could  not  give  a  pop  loud  enough 
to  be  heard  at  the  further  end  of  a  room,  who  can 
now  Discharge  a  Fan  in  such  a  manner,  that  it  shall 
make  a  report  like  a  pocket-pistol.  I  have  likewise 
taken  care  (in  order  to  hinder  young  women  from 
letting  off  their  fans  in  wrong  places  or  unsuitable 
occasions)  to  show  upon  what  subject  the  crack  of 
a  fan  may  come  in  properly.  I  have  likewise  in- 
vented a  fan,  with  which  a  girl  of  sixteen,  by  the 
help  of  a  little  wind  which  is  enclosed  about  one  of 
the  largest  sticks,  can  make  as  loud  a  crack  as  a 
woman  of  fifty  with  an  ordinary  fan. 

"  When  the  fans  are  thus  discharged,  the  word 
of  command  in  course  is  to  Ground  their  Fans. 
This  teaches  a  lady  to  quit  her  fan  gracefully  when 
she  throws  it  aside,  in  order  to  take  up  a  pack  of 
cards,  adjust  a  curl  of  hair,  replace  a  fallen  pin,  or 
apply  herself  to  any  other  matter  of  importance. 


Addison  75 

This  part  of  the  exercise,  as  it  only  consists  in  tossing 
a  fan  with  an  air  upon  a  long  table  (which  stands 
by  for  that  purpose)  may  be  learnt  in  two  days' 
time  as  well  as  in  a  twelvemonth. 

"  When  my  female  regiment  is  thus  disarmed,  I 
generally  let  them  walk  about  the  room  for  some 
time;  when  on  a  sudden  (like  ladies  that  look  upon 
their  watches  after  a  long  visit)  they  all  of  them 
hasten  to  their  arms,  catch  them  up  in  a  hurry,  and 
place  themselves  in  their  proper  stations  upon  my 
calling  out  Recover  your  Fans.  This  part  of  the 
exercise  is  not  difficult,  provided  a  woman  applies 
her  thoughts  to  it. 

"  The  Fluttering  of  the  Fan  is  the  last,  and,  in- 
deed, the  master-piece  of  the  whole  exercise;  but 
if  a  lady  does  not  misspend  her  time,  she  may  make 
herself  mistress  of  it  in  three  months.  I  generally 
lay  aside  the  dog-days  and  the  hot  time  of  the  sum- 
mer for  the  teaching  of  this  part  of  the  exercise ;  for 
as  soon  as  ever  I  pronounce  Flutter  your  Fans,  the 
place  is  filled  with  so  many  zephyrs  and  gentle 
breezes  as  are  very  refreshing  in  that  season  of  the 
year,  though  they  might  be  dangerous  to  ladies  of 
a  tender  constitution  in  any  other. 

"  There  is  an  infinite  variety  of  motions  to  be 
made  use  of  in  the  Flutter  of  a  Fan:  there  is  the 
angry  flutter,  the  modest  flutter,  the  timorous  flutter, 
the  confused  flutter,  the  merry  flutter,  and  the  amor- 
ous flutter,.  Not  to  be  tedious,  there  is  scarce  any 
emotion  in  the  mind  which  does  not  produce  a 
suitable  agitation  in  the  fan;  insomuch,  that  if  I 
only  see  the  fan  of  a  disciplined  lady,  I  know  very 
well  whether  she  laughs,  frowns,  or  blushes.  I  have 
seen  a  fan  so  very  angry,  that  it  would  have  been 


76  Best  English  Essays 

dangerous  for  the  absent  lover  who  provoked  it  to 
have  come  within  the  wind  of  it ;  and  at  other  times 
so  very  languishing,  that  I  have  been  glad  for  the 
lady's  sake  the  lover  was  at  a  sufficient  distance 
from  it.  I  need  not  add,  that  a  fan  is  either  a  prude 
or  coquette,  according  to  the  nature  of  the  person 
who  bears  it.  To  conclude  my  letter,  I  must  ac- 
quaint you,  that  I  have  from  my  own  observations 
compiled  a  little  treatise  for  the  use  of  my  scholars, 
entitled,  The  Passions  of  the  Fan ;  which  I  will 
communicate  to  you,  if  you  think  it  may  be  of  use 
to  the  public.  I  shall  have  a  general  review  on 
Thursday  next ;  to  which  you  shall  be  very  welcome 
if  you  will  honour  it  with  your  presence. 

"  I  am,"  etc. 

"  P.  S.  I  teach  young  gentlemen  the  whole  art  of 
gallanting  a  fan. 

"  N.  B.  I  have  several  little  plain  fans  made  for 
this  use,  to  avoid  expense." 


IV 
LAMB 


LAMB: 

GREATEST   OF   THE    HUMORISTS 

IN   spite  of   De   Quincey's   declaration   that 
Lamb  never  could  become  popular,  that  his 
literary  excellencies  were  too  fine  and  ex- 
quisite for  that,  Lamb  has  proved  to  be  the  most 
popular  essayist  who  ever  wrote  the  English  lan- 
guage.    Though  the  sum  total  of  his  good  work 
is  very  small,  his  position  is  as  secure  as  that  of 
any  writer  since  Shakespeare. 

Though  Lamb  may  be  compared  to  Addison 
at  his  best;  to  Goldsmith,  who  had  much  of  the 
same  overflowing  love  in  his  character  and  is 
all  but  as  fondly  loved  as  Lamb  himself;  to 
Thackeray,  who  always  was  a  man  of  love  and 
the  humor  of  love,  still  Charles  Lamb  stands 
unique,  unimitated  and  inimitable. 

The  only  way  in  which  we  can  understand 
Lamb  is  in  the  light  of  his  personal  history.  His 
father  was  all  his  life  a  servant  in  the  family  of  a 
Mr.  Salt,  a  barrister.  As  a  reward  for  faithful 
services  on  the  part  of  the  father,  Charles  Lamb 
the  son  was  sent  to  the  famous  London  school  of 
Christ's  Hospital,  where  he  came  into  contact 
with  Coleridge.  From  Christ's  Hospital  Coler- 


8o  Best  English  Essays 

idge  went  to  Oxford,  and  Lamb  to  be  a  clerk  in 
the  South  Sea  House.  Later  he  was  transferred 
to  the  India  House,  from  the  directors  of  which 
corporation  he  drew  a  salary  until  he  died,  a 
period  of  nearly  forty  years. 

Soon  after  he  entered  the  India  House,  when 
Lamb  was  twenty-one,  his  sister  Mary,  ten  years 
his  senior,  in  a  passing  fit  of  insanity,  killed  her 
mother  with  a  table  knife.  Soon  after,  their 
father  died.  Charles  was  attached  to  a  young 
lady  whom  he  hoped  to  marry;  but  he  gave  up 
his  prospect  in  this  direction,  and  devoted  his 
entire  life  to  his  sister.  She  was  confined  in  an 
asylum  for  a  time,  but  soon  recovered  her  sanity 
and  was  released  upon  her  brother's  making  him- 
self personally  responsible  for  her.  Her  attacks 
of  insanity  returned  many  times ;  but  she  herself 
could  feel  them  coming,  and  we  read  of  their 
going  hand  in  hand  across  the  fields  to  Hoxton 
(the  asylum).  Charles  himself  was  confined  in 
an  asylum  for  six  weeks. 

As  an  antidote  to  the  blues,  and  an  offset  to  the 
deathlike  cloud  always  hanging  over  him,  Lamb 
gathered  many  friends  about  him,  and  engaged 
in  regular  correspondence  with  some  of  the  best 
known  literary  characters  of  his  day.  As  his 
clerical  duties  did  not  begin  until  ten  o'clock,  and 
ended  at  four,  he  had  considerable  leisure  to 
study  and  cultivate  his  friends.  He  wrote  some 
verses  that  were  published  in  a  volume  with 
Coleridge's,  and  composed  two  dramatic  pieces, 


Lamb  8 1 

which  were  unsuccessful.  With  his  sister  he  re- 
wrote some  of  Shakespeare's  plays  in  the  form 
of  tales  for  children,  and  that  book  alone  of  his 
earlier  efforts  has  become  popular.  He  did  some 
editing  when  he  was  about  thirty-three,  after 
which  he  lapsed  into  literary  silence  for  twelve 
years.  Finally,  at  the  age  of  forty-five,  just  five 
years  before  he  was  to  retire  from  the  India 
House  on  a  pension,  he  contributed  to  the  "Lon- 
don Magazine,"  then  just  rehabilitated,  a  paper 
on  "  The  South  Sea  House,"  signing  it  "  Elia," 
—  the  name  of  an  Italian  fellow-clerk  of  those 
days  of  twenty-five  years  before.  The  success 
of  this  paper  brought  forth  the  best  of  the  other 
"  Essays  of  Elia  "  within  a  period  of  three  years. 
They  were  in  effect  Lamb's  letters  to  his  friends 
elaborated  into  permanent  literary  form;  and 
Lamb's  collected  "  Letters  "  must  stand  on  every 
bookshelf,  side  by  side  with  "  Elia." 

Lamb's  essays  and  letters  are  elaborate  play, 
the  foolery  that  best  dispels  the  blue-devils  with 
which  all  humanity  is  more  or  less  afflicted. 
What  he  himself  had  found  effective  through  a 
period  of  twenty-five  years  he  kindly  offers  to  us. 
The  tragedy  behind  it  all,  in  full  view  of  which 
the  essays  were  written,  makes  their  foolishness 
sublime.  If  Lamb,  by  the  recipe  which  he  offers, 
could  make  his  life  successful  and  happy  under 
the  trying  conditions  which  were  forced  upon 
him  and  which  would  certainly  have  wrecked  a 
less  truly  noble  character,  what  excuse  have  we 


82  Best  English  Essays 

for  being  sad  and  lugubrious  when  the  sun  is 
clouded  ? 

Probably  the  reason  why  no  one  has  succeeded 
in  imitating  Lamb's  style  successfully  is  that  no 
one  else  has  been  found  to  bear  what  he  bore  for 
forty  years  and  remain  so  light,  so  sweet,  so 
gentle,  and  so  good. 


LETTER   TO   COLERIDGE 

March  9,  1822. 

DEAR  C,  —  It  gives  me  great  satisfaction  to 
hear  that  the  pig  turned  out  so  well,1  —  they 
are  interesting  creatures  at  a  certain  age;  what  a 
pity  such  buds  should  blow  out  into  the  maturity  of 
rank  bacon !  You  had  all  some  of  the  crackling  — 
and  brain  sauce;  did  you  remember  to  rub  it  with 
butter,  and  gently  dredge  it  a  little,  just  before  the 
crisis?  Did  the  eyes  come  away  kindly,  with  no 
CEdipean  avulsion  ?  Was  the  crackling  the  colour  of 
the  ripe  pomegranate?  Had  you  no  cursed  com- 
plement of  boiled  neck  of  mutton  before  it,  to  blunt 
the  edge  of  delicate  desire?  Did  you  flesh  maiden 
teeth  in  it  ?  Not  that  I  sent  the  pig,  or  can  form  the 
remotest  guess  what  part  Owen  could  play  in  the 
business.  I  never  knew  him  give  anything  away  in 
my  life.  He  would  not  begin  with  strangers.  I 
suspect  the  pig,  after  all,  was  meant  for  me ;  but  at 
the  unlucky  juncture  of  time  being  absent,  the  pres- 
ent somehow  went  round  to  Highgate.  To  confess 

1  Some  one  had  sent  Coleridge  a  pig,  and  the  gift  was  errone- 
ously credited  to  Lamb. 


Lamb  83 

an  honest  truth,  a  pig  is  one  of  those  things  I  could 
never  think  of  sending  away.  Teals,  widgeons, 
snipes,  barn-door  fowl,  ducks,  geese,  —  your  tame 
villatic  things,  —  Welsh  mutton,  collars  of  brawn, 
sturgeon,  fresh  or  pickled,  your  potted  char,  Swiss 
cheeses,  French  pies,  early  grapes,  muscadines,  I 
impart  as  freely  unto  my  friends  as  to  myself.  They 
are  but  self-extended ;  but  pardon  me  if  I  stop  some- 
where. Where  the  fine  feeling  of  benevolence 
giveth  a  higher  smack  than  the  sensual  rarity,  there 
my  friends  (or  any  good  man)  may  command  me; 
but  pigs  are  pigs,  and  I  myself  therein  am  nearest 
to  myself.  Nay,  I  should  think  it  an  affront,  an 
undervaluing  done  to  Nature,  who  bestowed  such 
a  boon  upon  me,  if  in  a  churlish  mood  I  parted  with 
the  precious  gift.  One  of  the  bitterest  pangs  I  ever 
felt  of  remorse  was  when  a  child.  My  kind  old 
aunt  had  strained  her  pocket-strings  to  bestow  a 
sixpenny  whole  plum-cake  upon  me.  In  my  way 
home  through  the  Borough,  I  met  a  venerable  old 
man,  not  a  mendicant,  but  thereabouts,  —  a  look- 
beggar,  not  a  verbal  petitionist;  and  in  the  cox- 
combry of  taught-charity,  I  gave  away  the  cake  to 
him.  I  walked  on  a  little  in  all  the  pride  of  an 
Evangelical  peacock,  when  of  a  sudden  my  old 
aunt's  kindness  crossed  me,  —  the  sum  it  was  to 
her;  the  pleasure  she  had  a  right  to  expect  that  I 
—  not  the  old  impostor  —  should  take  in  eating  her 
cake;  the  cursed  ingratitude  by  which,  under  the 
colour  of  a  Christian  virtue,  I  had  frustrated  her 
cherished  purpose.  I  sobbed,  wept,  and  took  it  to 
heart  so  grievously  that  I  think  I  never  suffered  the 
like;  and  I  was  right.  It  was  a  piece  of  unfeeling 
hypocrisy,  and  proved  a  lesson  to  me  ever  after. 


84  Best  English  Essays 

The  cake  has  long  been  masticated,  consigned  to 
dunghill  with  the  ashes  of  that  unseasonable  pauper. 

But  when  Providence,  who  is  better  to  us  all  than 
our  aunts,  gives  me  a  pig,  remembering  my  temp- 
tation and  my  fall,  I  shall  endeavour  to  act  towards 
it  more  in  the  spirit  of  the  donor's  purpose. 

Yours  (short  of  pig)  to  command  in  everything, 

C.  L. 


A   DISSERTATION   UPON   ROAST    PIG 

MANKIND,  says  a  Chinese  manuscript,  which 
my  friend  M.  was  obliging  enough  to  read 
and  explain  to  me,  for  the  first  seventy  thousand 
ages  ate  their  meat  raw,  clawing  or  biting  it  from 
the  living  animal,  just  as  they  do  in  Abyssinia  to 
this  day.  This  period  is  not  obscurely  hinted  at  by 
their  great  Confucius  in  the  second  chapter  of  his 
Mundane  Mutations,  where  he  designates  a  kind 
of  golden  age  by  the  term  Cho-fang,  literally  the 
Cooks'  Holiday.  The  manuscript  goes  on  to  say, 
that  the  art  of  roasting,  or  rather  broiling  (which  I 
take  to  be  the  elder  brother)  was  accidentally  dis- 
covered in  the  manner  following.  The  swine-herd, 
Ho-ti,  having  gone  out  into  the  woods  one  morning, 
as  his  manner  was,  to  collect  mast  for  his  hogs,  left 
his  cottage  in  the  care  of  his  eldest  son  Bo-bo,  a 
great  lubberly  boy,  who  being  fond  of  playing  with 
fire,  as  younkers  of  his  age  commonly  are,  let  some 
sparks  escape  into  a  bundle  of  straw,  which  kindling 
quickly,  spread  the  conflagration  over  every  part 
of  their  poor  mansion,  till  it  was  reduced  to  ashes. 
Together  with  the  cottage  (a  sorry  antediluvian 


Lamb  85 

make-shift  of  a  building,  you  may  think  it),  what 
was  of  much  more  importance,  a  fine  litter  of  new- 
farrowed  pigs,  no  less  than  nine  in  number,  per- 
ished. China  pigs  have  been  esteemed  a  luxury  all 
over  the  East,  from  the  remotest  periods  that  we 
read  of.  Bo-bo  was  in  the  utmost  consternation,  as 
you  may  think,  not  so  much  for  the  sake  of  the  tene- 
ment, which  his  father  and  he  could  easily  build  up 
again  with  a  few  dry  branches,  and  the  labour  of  an 
hour  or  two,  at  any  time,  as  for  the  loss  of  the  pigs. 
While  he  was  thinking  what  he  should  say  to  his 
father,  and  wringing  his  hands  over  the  smoking 
remnants  of  one  of  those  untimely  sufferers,  an 
odour  assailed  his  nostrils,  unlike  any  scent  which 
he  had  before  experienced.  What  could  it  proceed 
from  ?  —  not  from  the  burnt  cottage  —  he  had  smelt 
that  smell  before — indeed,  this  was  by  no  means  the 
first  accident  of  the  kind  which  had  occurred  through 
the  negligence  of  this  unlucky  young  firebrand. 
Much  less  did  it  resemble  that  of  any  known  herb, 
weed,  or  flower.  A  premonitory  moistening  at  the 
same  time  overflowed  his  nether  lip.  He  knew  not 
what  to  think.  He  next  stooped  down  to  feel  the 
pig,  if  there  were  any  signs  of  life  in  it.  He  burnt 
his  fingers,  and  to  cool  them  he  applied  them  in  his 
booby  fashion  to  his  mouth.  Some  of  the  crumbs 
of  the  scorched  skin  had  come  away  with  his  fingers, 
and  for  the  first  time  in  his  life  (in  the  world's  life 
indeed,  for  before  him  no  man  had  known  it)  he 
tasted  —  crackling!  Again  he  felt  and  fumbled  at 
the  pig.  It  did  not  burn  him  so  much  now,  still  he 
licked  his  fingers  from  a  sort  of  habit.  The  truth  at 
length  broke  into  his  slow  understanding,  that  it 
was  the  pig  that  smelt  so,  and  the  pig  that  tasted  so 


86  Best  English  Essays 

delicious ;  and  surrendering  himself  up  to  the  new- 
born pleasure,  'he  fell  to  tearing  up  whole  handfuls 
of  the  scorched  skin  with  the  flesh  next  it,  and  was 
cramming  it  down  his  throat  in  his  beastly  fashion, 
when  his  sire  entered  amid  the  smoking  rafters, 
armed  with  retributory  cudgel,  and  finding  how 
affairs  stood,  began  to  rain  blows  upon  the  young 
rogue's  shoulders,  as  thick  as  hail-stones,  which 
Bo-bo  heeded  not  any  more  than  if  they  had  been 
flies.  The  tickling  pleasure,  which  he  experienced 
in  his  lower  regions,  had  rendered  him  quite  callous 
to  any  inconveniences  he  might  feel  in  those  remote 
quarters.  His  father  might  lay  on,  but  he  could  not 
beat  him  from  his  pig,  till  he  had  fairly  made  an 
end  of  it,  when,  becoming  a  little  more  sensible  of 
his  situation,  something  like  the  following  dialogue 
ensued. 

"  You  graceless  whelp,  what  have  you  got  there 
devouring?  Is  it  not  enough  that  you  have  burnt 
me  down  three  houses  with  your  dog's  tricks,  and 
be  hanged  to  you !  but  you  must  be  eating  fire,  and 
I  know  not  what  —  what  have  you  got  there,  I 
say?" 

"  O  father,  the  pig,  the  pig !  do  come  and  taste 
how  nice  the  burnt  pig  eats." 

The  ears  of  Ho-ti  tingled  with  horror.  He  cursed 
his  son,  and  he  cursed  himself  that  ever  he  should 
beget  a  son  that  should  eat  burnt  pig. 

Bo-bo,  whose  scent  was  wonderfully  sharpened 
since  morning,  soon  raked  out  another  pig,  and 
fairly  rending  it  asunder,  thrust  the  lesser  half  by 
main  force  into  the  fists  of  Ho-ti,  still  shouting  out, 
"  Eat,  eat,  eat  the  burnt  pig,  father,  only  taste  — 
O  Lord!  "  —  with  such-like  barbarous  ejaculations, 
cramming  all  the  while  as  if  he  would  choke. 


Lamb  87 

Ho-ti  trembled  every  joint  while  he  grasped  the 
abominable  thing-,  wavering  whether  he  should  not 
put  his  son  to  death  for  an  unnatural  young  mon- 
ster, when  the  crackling  scorching  his  fingers,  as  it 
had  done  his  son's,  and  applying  the  same  remedy  to 
them,  he  in  his  turn  tasted  some  of  its  flavour,  which, 
make  what  sour  mouths  he  would  for  a  pretence, 
proved  not  altogether  displeasing  to  him.  In  con- 
clusion (for  the  manuscript  here  is  a  little  tedious), 
both  father  and  son  fairly  set  down  to  the  mess,  and 
never  left  off  till  they  had  despatched  all  that  re- 
mained of  the  litter. 

Bo-bo  was  strictly  enjoined  not  to  let  the  secret 
escape,  for  the  neighbours  would  certainly  have 
stoned  them  for  a  couple  of  abominable  wretches, 
who  could  think  of  improving  upon  the  good  meat 
which  God  had  sent  them.  Nevertheless,  strange 
stories  got  about.  It  was  observed  that  Ho-ti's 
cottage  was  burnt  down  now  more  frequently  than 
ever.  Nothing  but  fires  from  this  time  forward. 
Some  would  break  out  in  broad  day,  others  in  the 
night-time.  As  often  as  the  sow  farrowed,  so  sure 
was  the  house  of  Ho-ti  to  be  in  a  blaze ;  and  Ho-ti 
himself,  which  was  the  more  remarkable,  instead  of 
chastising  his  son,  seemed  to  grow  more  indulgent 
to  him  than  ever.  At  length  they  were  watched, 
the  terrible  mystery  discovered,  and  father  and  son 
summoned  to  take  their  trial  at  Pekin,  then  an  in- 
considerable assize  town.  Evidence  was  given,  the 
obnoxious  food  itself  produced  in  court,  and  verdict 
about  to  be  pronounced,  when  the  foreman  of  the 
jury  begged  that  some  of  the  burnt  pig,  of  which 
the  culprits  stood  accused,  might  be  handed  into  the 
box.  He  handled  it,  and  they  all  handled  it;  and 


88  Best  English  Essays 

burning  their  fingers,  as  Bo-bo  and  his  father  had 
done  before  them,  and  nature  prompting  to  each  of 
them  the  same  remedy,  against  the  face  of  all  the 
facts,  and  the  clearest  charge  which  judge  had  ever 
given,  —  to  the  surprise  of  the  whole  court,  towns- 
folk, strangers,  reporters,  and  all  present  —  without 
leaving  the  box,  or  any  manner  of  consultation  what- 
ever, they  brought  in  a  simultaneous  verdict  of  Not 
Guilty. 

The  judge,  who  was  a  shrewd  fellow,  winked  at 
the  manifest  iniquity  of  the  decision :  and  when  the 
court  was  dismissed,  went  privily  and  bought  up  all 
the  pigs  that  could  be  had  for  love  or  money.  In  a 
few  days  his  lordship's  town-house  was  observed  to 
be  on  fire.  The  thing  took  wing,  and  now  there  was 
nothing  to  be  seen  but  fires  in  every  direction.  Fuel 
and  pigs  grew  enormously  dear  all  over  the  district. 
The  insurance-offices  one  and  all  shut  up  shop. 
People  built  slighter  and  slighter  every  day,  until  it 
was  feared  that  the  very  science  of  architecture 
would  in  no  long  time  be  lost  to  the  world.  Thus 
this  custom  of  firing  houses  continued,  till  in  process 
of  time,  says  my  manuscript,  a  sage  arose,  like  our 
Locke,  who  made  a  discovery  that  the  flesh  of  swine, 
or  indeed  of  any  other  animal,  might  be  cooked 
(burnt,  as  they  called  it)  without  the  necessity  of 
consuming  a  whole  house  to  dress  it.  Then  first 
began  the  rude  form  of  a  gridiron.  Roasting  by  the 
string  or  spit  came  in  a  century  or  two  later,  I 
forget  in  whose  dynasty.  By  such  slow  degrees, 
concludes  the  manuscript,  do  the  most  useful,  and 
seemingly  the  most  obvious,  arts  make  their  way 
among  mankind 

Without  placing  too  implicit  faith  in  the  account 


Lamb  89 

above  given,  it  must  be  agreed  that  if  a  worthy 
pretext  for  so  dangerous  an  experiment  as  setting 
houses  on  fire  (especially  in  these  days)  could  be 
assigned  in  favour  of  any  culinary  object,  that  pre- 
text and  excuse  might  be  found  in  ROAST  PIG. 

Of  all  the  delicacies  in  the  whole  mundus  edibilis,1 
I  will  maintain  it  to  be  the  most  delicate  —  princeps 
obsoniornm.2 

I  speak  not  of  your  grown  porkers  —  things  be- 
tween pig  and  pork  —  those  hobbledehoys  —  but  a 
young  and  tender  suckling  —  under  a  moon  old  — 
guiltless  as  yet  of  the  sty  —  with  no  original  speck 
of  the  amor  immunditice,3  the  hereditary  failing  of 
the  first  parent,  yet  manifest  —  his  voice  as  yet  not 
broken,  but  something  between  a  childish  treble  and 
a  grumble  —  the  mild  forerunner  or  praludium  of 
a  grunt. 

He  must  be  roasted.  I  am  not  ignorant  that  our 
ancestors  ate  them  seethed,  or  boiled  —  but  what  a 
sacrifice  of  the  exterior  tegument! 

There  is  no  flavour  comparable,  I  will  contend,  to 
that  of  the  crisp,  tawny,  well-watched,  not  over- 
roasted, crackling,  as  it  is  well  called  —  the  very 
teeth  are  invited  to  their  share  of  the  pleasure  at 
this  banquet  in  overcoming  the  coy,  brittle  resist- 
ance —  with  the  adhesive  oleaginous  —  O  call  it 
not  fat!  but  an  indefinable  sweetness  growing  up 
to  it  —  the  tender  blossoming  of  fat  —  fat  cropped 
in  the  bud  —  taken  in  the  shoot  —  in  the  first  inno- 
cence —  the  cream  and  quintessence  of  the  child- 
pig's  yet  pure  food  —  the  lean,  no  lean,  but  a  kind 
of  animal  manna  —  or,  rather,  fat  and  lean  (if  it 

1  Edible  world.  2  Chief  of  viands. 

3  Love  of  uncleanness. 


90  Best  English  Essays 

must  be  so)  so  blended  and  running  into  each  other, 
that  both  together  make  but  one  ambrosian  result  or 
common  substance. 

Behold  him  while  he  is  "  doing  "  —  it  seemeth 
rather  a  refreshing  warmth,  than  a  scorching  heat, 
that  he  is  so  passive  to.  How  equably  he  twirleth 
round  the  string !  Now  he  is  just  done.  To  see  the 
extreme  sensibility  of  that  tender  age!  he  hath 
wept  out  his  pretty  eyes  —  radiant  jellies  —  shoot- 
ing stars.  — - 

See  him  in  the  dish,  his  second  cradle,  how  meek 
he  lieth !  —  wouldst  thou  have  had  this  innocent 
grow  up  to  the  grossness  and  indocility  which  too 
often  accompany  maturer  swinehood?  Ten  to  one 
he  would  have  proved  a  glutton,  a  sloven,  an  ob- 
stinate, disagreeable  animal  —  wallowing  in  all 
manner  of  filthy  conversation  —  from  these  sins  he 
is  happily  snatched  away  — 

Ere  sin  could  blight  or  sorrow  fade, 
Death  came  with  timely  care  — 

his  memory  is  odoriferous  —  no  clown  curseth, 
while  his  stomach  half  rejecteth,  the  rank  bacon  — 
no  coalheaver  bolteth  him  in  reeking  sausages  —  he 
hath  a  fair  sepulchre  in  the  grateful  stomach  of  the 
judicious  epicure  —  and  for  such  a  tomb  might  be 
content  to  die. 

He  is  the  best  of  sapors.  Pine-apple  is  great. 
She  is  indeed  almost  too  transcendent  —  a  delight, 
if  not  sinful,  yet  so  like  to  sinning,  that  really  a 
tender-conscieticed  person  would  do  well  to  pause 
—  too  ravishing  for  mortal  taste,  she  woundeth  and 
excoriateth  the  lips  that  approach  her  —  like  lovers' 
kisses,  she  biteth  —  she  is  a  pleasure  bordering  on 


Lamb  91 

pain  from  the  fierceness  and  insanity  of  her  relish 
—  but  she  stoppeth  at  the  palate  —  she  meddleth  not 
with  the  appetite  —  and  the  coarsest  hunger  might 
barter  her  consistently  for  a  mutton-chop. 

Pig  —  let  me  speak  his  praise  —  is  no  less  pro- 
vocative of  the  appetite  than  he  is  satisfactory  to  the 
criticalness  of  the  censorious  palate.  The  strong 
man  may  batten  on  him,  and  the  weakling  refuseth 
not  his  mild  juices. 

Unlike  to  mankind's  mixed  characters,  a  bundle 
of  virtues  and  vices,  inexplicably  intertwisted,  and 
not  to  be  unravelled  without  hazard,  he  is  —  good 
throughout.  No  part  of  him  is  better  or  worse  than 
another.  He  helpeth,  as  far  as  his  little  means 
extend,  all  around.  He  is  the  least  envious  of  ban- 
quets. He  is  all  neighbours'  fare. 

I  am  one  of  those  who  freely  and  ungrudgingly 
impart  a  share  of  the  good  things  of  this  life  which 
fall  to  their  lot  (few  as  mine  are  in  this  kind)  to  a 
friend.  I  protest  I  take  as  great  an  interest  in  my 
friend's  pleasures,  his  relishes,  and  proper  satis- 
factions, as  in  mine  own.  "  Presents,"  I  often  say, 
"  endear  Absents."  Hares,  pheasants,  partridges, 
snipes,  barn-door  chickens  (those  "  tame  villatic 
fowl"),  capons,  plovers,  brawn,  barrels  of  oysters, 
I  dispense  as  freely  as  I  receive  them.  I  love  to 
taste  them,  as  it  were,  upon  the  tongue  of  my  friend. 
But  a  stop  must  be  put  somewhere.  One  would  not, 
like  Lear,  "give  everything."  I  make  my  stand  upon 
pig.  Methinks  it  is  an  ingratitude  to  the  Giver  of 
all  good  flavours  to  extra-domiciliate,  or  send  out  of 
the  house  slightingly  (under  pretext  of  friendship, 
or  I  know  not  what)  a  blessing  so  particularly 
adapted,  predestined,  I  may  say,  to  my  individual 
palate.  —  It  argues  an  insensibility. 


92  Best  English  Essays 

I  remember  a  touch  of  conscience  in  this  kind  at 
school.  My  good  old  aunt,  who  never  parted  from 
me  at  the  end  of  a  holiday  without  stuffing  a  sweet- 
meat, or  some  nice  thing,  into  my  pocket,  had  dis- 
missed me  one  evening  with  a  smoking  plum-cake, 
fresh  from  the  oven.  In  my  way  to  school  (it  was 
over  London  Bridge)  a  gray-headed  old  beggar  sa- 
luted me  (I  have  no  doubt,  at  this  time  of  day,  that 
he  was  a  counterfeit).  I  had  no  pence  to  console 
him  with,  and  in  the  vanity  of  self-denial,  and  the 
very  coxcombry  of  charity,  school-boy  like,  I  made 
him  a  present  of  —  the  whole  cake !  I  walked  on 
a  little,  buoyed  up,  as  one  is  on  such  occasions,  with 
a  sweet  soothing  of  self-satisfaction ;  but,  before  I 
had  got  to  the  end  of  the  bridge,  my  better  feelings 
returned,  and  I  burst  into  tears,  thinking  how  un- 
grateful I  had  been  to  my  good  aunt,  to  go  and  give 
her  good  gift  away  to  a  stranger  that  I  had  never 
seen  before,  and  who  might  be  a  bad  man  for  aught 
I  knew ;  and  then  I  thought  of  the  pleasure  my  aunt 
would  be  taking  in  thinking  that  I  —  I  myself,  and 
not  another  —  would  eat  her  nice  cake  —  and  what 
should  I  say  to  her  the  next  time  I  saw  her  —  how 
naughty  I  was  to  part  with  her  pretty  present !  — 
and  the  odour  of  that  spicy  cake  came  back  upon  my 
recollection,  and  the  pleasure  and  the  curiosity  I  had 
taken  in  seeing  her  make  it,  and  her  joy  when  she 
sent  it  to  the  oven,  and  how  disappointed  she  would 
feel  that  I  had  never  had  a  bit  of  it  in  my  mouth  at 
last  —  and  I  blamed  my  impertinent  spirit  of  alms- 
giving, and  out-of-place  hypocrisy  of  goodness ;  aiid 
above  all  I  wished  never  to  see  the  face  again  of 
that  insidious,  good-for-nothing,  old  gray  impostor. 

Our  ancestors  were  nice  in  their  method  of  sacri- 


Lamb  93 

firing  these  tender  victims.  We  read  of  pigs  whipt 
to  death  with  something  of  a  shock,  as  we  hear  of 
any  other  obsolete  custom.  The  age  of  discipline 
is  gone  by,  or  it  would  be  curious  to  inquire  (in  a 
philosophical  light  merely)  what  effect  this  process 
might  have  towards  intenerating  and  dulcifying  a 
substance,  naturally  so  mild  and  dulcet  as  the  flesh 
of  young  pigs.  It  looks  like  refining  a  violet.  Yet 
we  should  be  cautious,  while  we  condemn  the  inhu- 
manity, how  we  censure  the  wisdom  of  the  prac- 
tice. It  might  impart  a  gusto.  — 

I  remember  an  hypothesis,  argued  upon  by  the 
young  students,  when  I  was  at  St.  Omer's,  and 
maintained  with  much  learning  and  pleasantry  on 
both  sides,  "  Whether,  supposing  that  the  flavour  of 
a  pig  who  obtained  his  death  by  whipping  (per 
flagellationem  extremam)  superadded  a  pleasure 
upon  the  palate  of  a  man  more  intense  than  any 
possible  suffering  we  can  conceive  in  the  animal,  is 
man  justified  in  using  that  method  of  putting  the 
animal  to  death  ?  "  I  forget  the  decision. 

His  sauce  should  be  considered.  Decidedly,  a 
few  bread  crumbs,  done  up  with  his  liver  and 
brains,  and  a  dash  of  mild  sage.  But  banish,  dear 
Mrs.  Cook,  I  beseech  you,  the  whole  onion  tribe. 
Barbecue  your  whole  hogs  to  your  palate,  steep 
them  in  shalots,  stuff  them  out  with  plantations  of 
the  rank  and  guilty  garlic ;  you  cannot  poison  them, 
or  make  them  stronger  than  they  are  —  but  con- 
sider, he  is  a  weakling  —  a  flower. 


94  Best  English  Essays 


MRS.    BATTLE'S   OPINIONS   ON   WHIST 

CLEAR  fire,  a  clean  hearth,  and  the  rigour 
of  the  game."  This  was  the  celebrated  -wish 
of  old  Sarah  Battle  (now  with  God), 'who,  next  to 
her  devotions,  loved  a  good  game  of  whist.  She 
was  none  of  your  lukewarm  gamesters,  your  half- 
and-half  players,  who  have  no  objection  to  take  a 
hand,  if  you  want  one  to  make  up  a  rubber;  who 
affirm  that  they  have  no  pleasure  in  winning;  that 
they  like  to  win  one  game  and  lose  another ;  that 
they  can  while  away  an  hour  very  agreeably  at  a 
card-table,  but  are  indifferent  whether  they  play  or 
no;  and  will  desire  an  adversary,  who  has  slipped 
a  wrong  card,  to  take  it  up  and  play  another.  These 
insufferable  triflers  are  the  curse  of  a  table.  One 
of  these  flies  will  spoil  a  whole  pot.  Of  such  it  may 
be  said  that  they  do  not  play  at  cards,  but  only  play 
at  playing  at  them. 

Sarah  Battle  was  none  of  that  breed.  She  de- 
tested them,  as  I  do,  from  her  heart  and  soul,  and 
would  not,  save  upon  a  striking  emergency,  will- 
ingly seat  herself  at  the  same  table  with  them. 
She  loved'  a  thorough-paced  partner,  a  determined 
enemy.  She  took,  and  gave,  no  concessions.  She 
hated  favours.  She  never  made  a  revoke,  nor  ever 
passed  it  over  in  her  adversary  without  exacting 
the  utmost  forfeiture.  She  fought  a  good  fight: 
cut  and  thrust.  She  held  not  her  good  sword  (her 
cards)  "  like  a  dancer."  She  sat  bolt  upright;  and 
neither  showed  you  her  cards,  nor  desired  to  see 
yours.  All  people  have  their  blind  side  —  their 


Lamb  95 

superstitions ;  and  I  have  heard  her  declare,  under 
the  rose,  that  Hearts  was  her  favourite  suit. 

I  never  in  my  life  —  and  I  knew  Sarah  Battle 
many  of  the  best  years  of  it  —  saw  her  take  out  her 
snuff-box  when  it  was  her  turn  to  play ;  or  snuff  a 
candle  in  the  middle  of  a  game ;  or  ring  for  a  ser- 
vant, till  it  was  fairly  over.  She  never  introduced, 
or  connived  at,  miscellaneous  conversation  during 
its  process.  As  she  emphatically  observed,  cards 
were  cards ;  and  if  I  ever  saw  unmingled  distaste  in 
her  fine  last-century  countenance,  it  was  at  the  airs 
of  a  young  gentleman  of  a  literary  turn,  who  had 
been  with  difficulty  persuaded  to  take  a  hand;  and 
who,  in  his  excess  of  candour,  declared,  that  he 
thought  there  was  no  harm  in  unbending  the  mind 
now  and  then,  after  serious  studies,  in  recreations 
of  that  kind !  She  could  not  bear  to  have  her  noble 
occupation,  to  which  she  wound  up  her  faculties, 
considered  in  that  light.  It  was  her  business,  her 
duty,  the  thing  she  came  into  the  world  to  do,  — 
and  she  did  it.  She  unbent  her  mind  afterwards  — 
over  a  book. 

Pope  was  her  favourite  author :  his  "  Rape  of  the 
Lock  "  her  favourite  work.  She  once  did  me  the  fa- 
vour to  play  over  with  me  (with  the  cards)  his  cele- 
brated game  of  Ombre  in  that  poem ;  and  to  explain 
to  me  how  far  it  agreed  with,  and  in  what  points  it 
would  be  found  to  differ  from,  tradrille.  Her  illus- 
trations were  apposite  and  poignant ;  and  I  had  the 
pleasure  of  sending  the  substance  of  them  to  Mr. 
Bowles;  but  I  suppose  they  came  too  late  to  be 
inserted  among  his  ingenious  notes  upon  that 
author. 

Quadrille,  she  has  often  told  me,  was  her  first 


96  Best  English  Essays 

love;  but  whist  had  engaged  her  maturer  esteem. 
The  former,  she  said,  was  showy  and  specious,  and 
likely  to  allure  young  persons.  The  uncertainty  and 
quick  shifting  of  partners  —  a  thing  which  the  con- 
stancy of  whist  abhors  ;  the  dazzling  supremacy  and 
regal  investiture  of  Spadille  —  absurd,  as  she  justly 
observed,  in  the  pure  aristocracy  of  whist,  where 
his  crown  and  garter  give  him  no  proper  power 
above  his  brother-nobility  of  the  Aces ;  —  the  giddy 
vanity,  so  taking  to  the  inexperienced,  of  playing 
alone ;  above  all,  the  overpowering  attractions  of 
a  Sans  Prendre  Vole,  —  to  the  triumph  of  which 
there  is  certainly  nothing  parallel  or  approaching, 
in  the  contingencies  of  whist ;  —  all  these,  she  would 
say,  make  quadrille  a  game  of  captivation  to  the 
young  and  enthusiastic.  But  whist  was  the  solider 
game :  that  was  her  word.  It  was  a  long  meal ;  not 
like  quadrille,  a  feast  of  snatches.  One  or  two 
rubbers  might  co-extend  in  duration  with  an  even- 
ing. They  gave  time  to  form  rooted  friendships, 
to  cultivate  steady  enmities.  She  despised  the 
chance-started,  capricious,  and  ever-fluctuating 
alliances  of  the  other.  The  skirmishes  of  quadrille, 
she  would  say,  reminded  her  of  the  petty  ephemeral 
embroilments  of  the  little  Italian  states,  depicted  by 
Machiavel :  perpetually  changing  postures  and  con- 
nexions ;  bitter  foes  to-day,  sugared  darlings  to- 
morrow ;  kissing  and  scratching  in  a  breath  ;  —  but 
the  wars  of  whist  were  comparable  to  the  long, 
steady,  deep-rooted,  rational  antipathies  of  the  great 
French  and  English  nations. 

A  grave  simplicity  was  what  she  chiefly  admired 
in  her  favourite  game.  There  was  nothing  silly  in 
it,  like  the  nob  in  cribbage  —  nothing  superfluous. 


Lamb  97 

No  flushes  —  that  most  irrational  of  all  pleas  that 
a  reasonable  being  can  set  up :  —  that  any  one  should 
claim  four  by  virtue  of  holding  cards  of  the  same 
mark  and  colour,  without  reference  to  the  playing  of 
the  game,  or  the  individual  worth  or  pretensions 
of  the  cards  themselves !  She  held  this  to  be  a  sole- 
cism ;  as  pitiful  an  ambition  at  cards  as  alliteration 
is  in  authorship.  She  despised  superficiality,  and 
looked  deeper  than  the  colours  of  things.  —  Suits 
were  soldiers,  she  would  say,  and  must  have  an 
uniformity  of  array  to  distinguish  them:  but  what 
should  we  say  to  a  foolish  squire,  who  should  claim 
a  merit  from  dressing  up  his  tenantry  in  red  jackets, 
that  never  were  to  be  marshalled  —  never  to  take 
the  field  ?  —  She  even  wished  that  whist  were  more 
simple  than  it  is ;  and,  in  my  mind,  would  have 
stripped  it  of  some  appendages,  which,  in  the  state 
of  human  frailty,  may  be  venially,  and  even  com- 
mendably,  allowed  of.  She  saw  no  reason  for  the 
deciding  of  the  trump  by  the  turn  of  the  card.  Why 
not  one  suit  always  trumps  ?  —  Why  two  colours, 
when  the  mark  of  the  suit  would  have  sufficiently 
distinguished  them  without  it? 

"  But  the  eye,  my  dear  madam,  is  agreeably  re- 
freshed with  the  variety.  Man  is  not  a  creature  of 
pure  reason  —  he  must  have  his  senses  delightfully 
appealed  to.  We  see  it  in  Roman  Catholic  countries, 
where  the  music  and  the  paintings  draw  in  many 
to  worship,  whom  your  quaker  spirit  of  unsensual- 
izing  would  have  kept  out.  —  You  yourself  have  a 
pretty  collection  of  paintings  —  but  confess  to  me, 
whether,  walking  in  your  gallery  at  Sandham, 
among  those  clear  Vandykes,  or  among  the  Paul 
Potters  in  the  ante-room,  you  ever  felt  your  bosom 

7 


98  Best  English  Essays 

glow  with  an  elegant  delight,  at  all  comparable 
to  that  you  have  it  in  your  power  to  experience 
most  evenings  over  a  well-arranged  assortment 
of  the  court-cards?  —  the  pretty  antic  habits,  like 
heralds  in  a  procession  —  the  gay  triumph-assuring 
scarlets  —  the  contrasting  deadly-killing  sables  — 
the  '  hoary  majesty  of  spades '  —  Pam  in  all  his 
glory !  — 

"  All  these  might  be  dispensed  with ;  and  with 
their  naked  names  upon  the  drab  pasteboard,  the 
game  might  go  on  very  well,  pictureless.  But  the 
beauty  of  cards  would  be  extinguished  for  ever. 
Stripped  of  all  that  is  imaginative  in  them,  they 
must  degenerate  into  mere  gambling.  Imagine  a 
dull  deal  board,  or  drum  head,  to  spread  them  on, 
instead  of  that  nice  verdant  carpet  (next  to  na- 
ture's), fittest  arena  for  those  courtly  combatants 
to  play  their  gallant  jousts  and  turneys  in !  —  Ex- 
change those  delicately-turned  ivory  markers  — 
(work  of  Chinese  artist,  unconscious  of  their  sym- 
bol, —  or  as  profanely  slighting  their  true  appli- 
cation as  the  arrantest  Ephesian  journeyman  that 
turned  out  those  little  shrines  for  the  goddess)  — 
exchange  them  for  little  bits  of  leather  (our  ances- 
tors' money),  or  chalk  and  a  slate!  "  — 

The  old  lady,  with  a  smile,  confessed  the  sound- 
ness of  my  logic ;  and  to  her  approbation  of  my  ar- 
guments on  her  favourite  topic  that  evening,  I  have 
always  fancied  myself  indebted  for  the  legacy  of  a 
curious  cribbage-board,  made  of  the  finest  Sienna 
marble,  which  her  maternal  uncle  (old  Walter 
Plumer,  whom  I  have  elsewhere  celebrated), 
brought  with  him  from  Florence :  —  this,  and  a 
trifle  of  five  hundred  pounds,  came  to  me  at  her 
death. 


Lamb  go 

The  former  bequest  (which  I  do  not  least  value), 
I  have  kept  with  religious  care ;  though  she  herself, 
to  confess  a  truth,  was  never  greatly  taken  with 
cribbage.  It  was  an  essentially  vulgar  game,  I 
have  heard  her  say,  —  disputing  with  her  uncle,  who 
was  very  partial  to  it.  She  could  never  heartily 
bring  her  mouth  to  pronounce  "Go  "  —  or  "  That 's 
a  go."  She  called  it  an  ungrammatical  game.  The 
pegging  teased  her.  I  once  knew  her  to  forfeit 
a  rubber  (a  five-dollar  stake)  because  she  would 
not  take  advantage  of  the  turn-up  knave,  which 
would  have  given  it  her,  but  which  she  must  have 
claimed  by  the  disgraceful  tenure  of  declaring  "  two 
for  his  heels."  There  is  something  extremely  gen- 
teel in  this  sort  of  self-denial.  Sarah  Battle  was  a 
gentlewoman  born. 

Piquet  she  held  the  best  game  at  the  cards  for  two 
persons,  though  she  would  ridicule  the  pedantry  of 
the  terms  —  such  as  pique  —  repique  —  the  capot 

—  they  savoured  (she  thought)  of  affectation.    But 
games  for  two,  or  even  three,  she  never  greatly 
cared  for.    She  loved  the  quadrate,  or  square.    She 
would  argue  thus : — Cards  are  warfare :  the  ends  are 
gain,  with  glory.    But  cards  are  war,  in  disguise  of 
a  sport :  when  single  adversaries  encounter,  the  ends 
proposed  are  too  palpable.     By  themselves,  it  is  too 
close  a  fight;    with  spectators,  it  is  not  much  bet- 
tered.    No  looker-on  can  be  interested,  except  for 
a  bet,  and  then  it  is  a  mere  affair  of  money ;  he  cares 
not  for  your  luck  sympathetically,  or  for  your  play. 

—  Three  are  still  worse;    a  mere  naked   war  of 
every  man  against  every  man,  as  in  cribbage,  with- 
out league  or  alliance;    or  a  rotation  of  petty  and 
contradictory    interests,    a   succession    of    heartless 


ioo  Best  English  Essays 

leagues,  and  not  much  more  hearty  infractions  of 
them,  as  in  tradrille.  —  But  in  square  games  (she 
meant  whist),  all  that  is  possible  to  be  attained  in 
card-playing  is  accomplished.  There  are  the  in- 
centives of  profit  with  honour,  common  to  every 
species  —  though  the  latter  can  be  but  very  imper- 
fectly enjoyed  in  those  other  games,  where  the 
spectator  is  only  feebly  a  participator.  But  the 
parties  in  whist  are  spectators  and  principals  too. 
They  are  a  theatre  to  themselves,  and  a  looker-on  is 
not  wanted.  He  is  rather  worse  than  nothing,  and 
an  impertinence.  Whist  abhors  neutrality,  or  in- 
terests beyond*  its  sphere.  You  glory  in  some  sur- 
prising stroke  of  skill  or  fortune,  not  because  a  cold 
—  or  even  an  interested  —  bystander  witnesses  it, 
but  because  your  partner  sympathizes  in  the  contin- 
gency. You  win  for  two.  You  triumph  for  two. 
Two  are  exalted.  Two  again  are  mortified ;  which 
divides  their  disgrace,  as  the  conjunction  doubles 
(by  taking  off  the  invidiousness)  your  glories. 
Two  losing  to  two  are  better  reconciled,  than  one  to 
one  in  that  close  butchery.  The  hostile  feeling  is 
weakened  by  multiplying  the  channels.  War  be- 
comes a  civil  game.  By  such  reasonings  as  these 
the  old  lady  was  accustomed  to  defend  her  favourite 
pastime. 

No  inducement  could  ever  prevail  upon  her  to 
play  at  any  game,  where  chance  entered  into  the 
composition,  for  nothing.  Chance,  she  would  argue 
—  and  here  again,  admire  the  subtlety  of  her  con- 
clusion;—  chance  is  nothing,  but  where  something 
else  depends  upon  it.  It  is  obvious  that  cannot  be 
glory.  What  rational  cause -of  exultation  could  it 
give  to  a  man  to  turn  up  size  ace  a  hundred  times 


Lamb  101 

together  by  himself?  or  before  spectators,  where 
no  stake  was  depending  ?  —  Make  a  lottery  of  a 
hundred  thousand  tickets  with  but  one  fortunate 
number  —  and  what  possible  principle  of  our  nature, 
except  stupid  wonderment,  could  it  gratify  to  gain 
that  number  as  many  times  successively  without 
a  prize?  Therefore  she  disliked  the  mixture  of 
chance  in  backgammon,  where  it  was  not  played  for 
money.  She  called  it  foolish,  and  those  people 
idiots,  who  were  taken  with  a  lucky  hit  under  such 
circumstances.  Games  of  pure  skill  were  as  little 
to  her  fancy.  Played  for  a  stake,  they  were  a  mere 
system  of  over-reaching.  Played  for  glory,  they 
were  a  mere  setting  of  one  man's  wit  —  his 
memory,  or  combination-faculty  rather  —  against 
another's ;  like  a  mock-engagement  at  a  review, 
bloodless  and  profitless.  She  could  not  conceive  a 
game  wanting  the  sprightly  infusion  of  chance,  the 
handsome  excuses  of  good  fortune.  Two  people 
playing  at  chess  in  a  corner  of  a  room,  whilst  whist 
was  stirring  in  the  centre,  would  inspire  her  with 
insufferable  horror  and  ennui.  Those  well-cut 
similitudes  of  Castles  and  Knights,  the  imagery  of 
the  board,  she  would  argue,  (and  I  think  in  this 
case  justly)  were  entirely  misplaced  and  senseless. 
Those  hard-head  contests  can  in  no  instance  ally 
with  the  fancy.  They  reject  form  and  colour.  A 
pencil  and  dry  slate  (she  used  to  say)  were  the 
proper  arena  for  such  combatants. 

To  those  puny  objectors  against  cards,  as  nur- 
turing the  bad  passions,  she  would  retort,  that  man 
is  a  gaming  animal.  He  must  be  always  trying  to 
get  the  better  in  something  or  other :  —  that  this 
passion  can  scarcely  be  more  safely  expended  than 


IO2  Best  English  Essays 

upon  a  game  at  cards :  that  cards  are  a  temporary 
illusion ;  in  truth,  a  mere  drama ;  for  we  do  but 
play  at  being  mightily  concerned,  where  a  few  idle 
shillings  are  at  stake,  yet,  during  the  illusion,  we 
are  as  mightily  concerned  as  those  whose  stake  is 
crowns  and  kingdoms.  They  are  a  sort  of  dream- 
fighting;  much  ado,  great  battling,  and  little  blood- 
shed ;  mighty  means  for  disproportioned  ends : 
quite  as  diverting,  and  a  great  deal  more  innoxious, 
than  many  of  those  more  serious  games  of  life, 
which  men  play  without  esteeming  them  to  be  such. 

With  great  deference  to  the  old  lady's  judgment 
in  these  matters,  I  think  I  have  experienced  some 
moments  in  my  life,  when  playing  at  cards  for  noth- 
ing has  even  been  agreeable.  When  I  am  in  sick- 
ness, or  not  in  the  best  spirits,  I  sometimes  call  for 
the  cards,  and  play  a  game  at  piquet  for  love  with 
my  cousin  Bridget  —  Bridget  Elia. 

I  grant  there  is  something  sneaking  in  it;  but 
with  a  tooth-ache,  or  a  sprained  ankle,  —  when  you 
are  subdued  and  humble,  —  you  are  glad  to  put  up 
with  an  inferior  spring  of  action. 

There  is  such  a  thing  in  nature,  I  am  convinced, 
as  sick  ^vhist. 

I  grant  it  is  not  the  highest  style  of  man  — 
I  deprecate  the  manes  of  Sarah  Battle  —  she  lives 
not,  alas !  to  whom  I  should  apologise. 

At  such  times,  those  terms  which  my  old  friend 
objected  to,  come  in  as  something  admissible.  —  I 
love  to  get  a  tierce  or  a  quatorze,  though  they  mean 
nothing.  I  am  subdued  to  an  inferior  interest. 
Those  shadows  of  winning  amuse  me. 

That  last  game  I  had  with  my  sweet  cousin  (I 
capotted  her)  —  (dare  I  tell  thee,  how  foolish 


Lamb  103 

I  am?)  —  I  wished  it  might  have  lasted  for  ever, 
though  we  gained  nothing,  and  lost  nothing,  though 
it  was  a  mere  shade  of  play :  I  would  be  content 
to  go  on  in  that  idle  folly  for  ever.  The  pipkin 
should  be  ever  boiling,  that  was  to  prepare  the 
gentle  lenitive  to  my  foot,  which  Bridget  was 
doomed  to  apply  after  the  game  was  over :  and,  as 
I  do  not  much  relish  appliances,  there  it  should  ever 
bubble.  Bridget  and  I  should  be  ever  playing. 


POOR   RELATIONS 

A    POOR    relation  —  is    the    most    irrelevant 
thing  in  nature,  —  a  piece  of  impertinent 
correspondency,  —  an     odious     approximation,  — 
a   haunting  conscience,  —  a   preposterous   shadow, 
lengthening    in    the    noon-tide    of    our   prosperity, 

—  an    unwelcome    remembrancer,  —  a    perpetually 
recurring  mortification,  —  a  drain  on  your  purse, 

—  a   more   intolerable   dun   upon   your   pride,  —  a 
drawback  upon  success,  —  a  rebuke  to  your  rising, 

—  a  stain  in  your  blood,  —  a  blot  on  your  'scutch- 
eon, —  a  rent  in  your  garment,  —  a  death's  head 
at  your  banquet,  —  Agathocles'  pot,  —  a  Mordecai 
in  your  gate,  —  a  Lazarus  at  your  door,  —  a  lion  in 
your  path,  —  a  frog  in  your  chamber,  —  a  fly  in 
your  ointment,  —  a  mote  in  your  eye,  —  a  triumph 
to  your  enemy,  —  an  apology  to  your  friends,  —  the 
one  thing  not  needful,  —  the  hail  in  harvest,  —  the 
ounce  of  sour  in  a  pound  of  sweet. 

He  is  known  by  his  knock.     Your  heart  telleth 
you  "  That  is  Mr.  ."     A  rap,  between  famil- 


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iarity  and  respect;  that  demands,  and  at  the  same 
time  seems  to  despair  of,  entertainment.  He  en- 
tereth  smiling  and  —  embarrassed.  He  holdeth  out 
his  hand  to  you  to  shake,  and  —  draweth  it  back 
again.  He  casually  looketh  in  about  dinner-time  — 
when  the  table  is  full.  He  offereth  to  go  away, 
seeing  you  have  company  —  but  is  induced  to  stay. 
He  filleth  a  chair,  and  your  visitor's  two  children 
are  accommodated  at  a  side-table.  He  never  cometh 
upon  open  days,  when  your  wife  says,  with  some 

complacency,  "  My  dear,  perhaps  Mr. will  drop 

in  to-day."  He  remembereth  birth-days  —  and  pro- 
fesseth  he  is  fortunate  to  have  stumbled  upon  one. 
He  declareth  against  fish,  the  turbot  being  small  — 
yet  suffereth  himself  to  be  importuned  into  a  slice, 
against  his  first  resolution.  He  sticketh  by  the  port 
—  yet  will  be  prevailed  upon  to  empty  the  remainder 
glass  of  claret,  if  a  stranger  press  it  upon  him.  He 
is  a  puzzle  to  the  servants,  who  are  fearful  of  being 
too  obsequious,  or  not  civil  enough,  to  him.  The 
guests  think  "  they  have  seen  him  before."  Every 
one  speculateth  upon  his  condition;  and  the  most 
part  take  him  to  be  a  —  tide-waiter.  He  calleth  you 
by  your  Christian  name,  to  imply  that  his  other  is 
the  same  with  your  own.  He  is  too  familiar  by 
half,  yet  you  wish  he  had  less  diffidence.  With  half 
the  familiarity,  he  might  pass  for  a  casual  depend- 
ent ;  with  more  boldness,  he  would  be  in  no  danger 
of  being  taken  for  what  he  is.  He  is  too  humble  for 
a  friend ;  yet  taketh  on  him  more  state  than  befits 
a  client.  He  is  a  worse  guest  than  a  country  tenant, 
inasmuch  as  he  bringeth  up  no  rent  —  yet  't  is  odds, 
from  his  garb  and  demeanour,  that  your  guests  take 
him  for  one.  He  is  asked  to  make  one  at  the  whist 


•    Lamb  105 

table;  refuseth  on  the  score  of  poverty,  and  —  re- 
sents being  left  out.  When  the  company  break  up, 
he  proff ereth  to  go  for  a  coach  —  and  lets  the  ser- 
vant go.  He  recollects  your  grandfather ;  and  will 
thrust  in  some  mean  and  quite  unimportant  anec- 
dote —  of  the  family.  He  knew  it  when  it  was  not 
quite  so  flourishing  as  "  he  is  blest  in  seeing  it  now." 
He  reviveth  past  situations,  to  institute  what  he 
calleth — favourable  comparisons.  With  a  reflecting 
sort  of  congratulation,  he  will  inquire  the  price  of 
your  furniture:  and  insults  you  with  a  special  com- 
mendation of  your  window-curtains.  He  is  of 
opinion  that  the  urn  is  the  more  elegant  shape ;  but, 
after  all,  there  was  something  more  comfortable 
about  the  old  tea-kettle  —  which  you  must  remem- 
ber. He  dare  say  you  must  find  a  great  convenience 
in  having  a  carriage  of  your  own,  and  appealeth  to 
your  lady  if  it  is  not  so.  Inquireth  if  you  have  had 
your  arms  done  on  vellum  yet ;  and  did  not  know, 
till  lately,  that  such-and-such  had  been  the  crest  of 
the  family.  His  memory  is  unseasonable ;  his  com- 
pliments perverse ;  his  talk  a  trouble ;  his  stay  per- 
tinacious ;  and  when  he  goeth  away,  you  dismiss 
his  chair  into  a  corner  as  precipitately  as  possible, 
and  feel  fairly  rid  of  two  nuisances. 

There  is  a  worse  evil  under  the  sun,  and  that  is 
—  a  female  Poor  Relation.  You  may  do  something 
with  the  other;  you  may  pass  him  off  tolerably 
well ;  but  your  indigent  she-relative  is  hopeless. 
"  He  is  an  old  humorist,"  you  may  say,  "  and  affects 
to  go  threadbare.  His  circumstances  are  better  than 
folks  would  take  them  to  be.  You  are  fond  of 
having  a  Character  at  your  table,  and  truly  he  is 
one."  But  in  the  indications  of  female  poverty 


io6  Best  English  Essays 

there  can  be  no  disguise.  No  woman  dresses  below 
herself  from  caprice.  The  truth  must  out  without 

shuffling.     "  She  is  plainly  related  to  the  L 's ; 

or  what  does  she  at  their  house  ?  "  She  is,  in  all 
probability,  your  wife's  cousin.  Nine  times  out  of 
ten,  at  least,  this  is  the  case.  —  Her  garb  is  some- 
thing between  a  gentlewoman  and  a  beggar,  yet  the 
former  evidently  predominates.  She  is  most  pro- 
vokingly  humble,  and  ostentatiously  sensible  to 
her  inferiority.  He  may  require  to  be  repressed 
sometimes  —  aliquando  suffiaminandus  erat  —  but 
there  is  no  raising  her.  You  send  her  soup  at  din- 
ner, and  she  begs  to  be  helped  —  after  the  gentle- 
men. Mr. requests  the  honour  of  taking  wine 

with  her;  she  hesitates  between  Port  and  Madeira, 
and  chooses  the  former  —  because  he  does.  She 
calls  the  servant  Sir;  and  insists  on  not  troubling 
him  to  hold  her  plate.  The  housekeeper  patronises 
her.  The  children's  governess  takes  upon  her  to 
correct  her,  when  she  has  mistaken  the  piano  for  a 
harpsichord. 

Richard  Amlet,  Esq.,  in  the  play,  is  a  notable 
instance  of  the  disadvantages  to  which  this  chimer- 
ical notion  of  affinity  constituting  a  claim  to  ac- 
quaintance, may  subject  the  spirit  of  a  gentleman. 
A  little  foolish  blood  is  all  that  is  betwixt  him  and 
a  lady  with  a  great  estate.  His  stars  are  perpetually 
crossed  by  the  malignant  maternity  of  an  old  woman, 
who  persists  in  calling  him  "  her  son  Dick."  But 
she  has  wherewithal  in  the  end  to  recompense  his 
indignities,  and  float  him  again  upon  the  brilliant 
surface,  under  which  it  had  been  her  seeming  busi- 
ness and  pleasure  all  along  to  sink  him.  All  men, 
besides,  are  not  of  Dick's  temperament.  I  knew  an 


Lamb  107 

Amlet  in  real  life,  who,  wanting  Dick's  buoyancy, 

sank  indeed.    Poor  W was  of  my  own  standing 

at  Christ's,  a  fine  classic,  and  a  youth  of  promise. 
If  he  had  a  blemish,  it  was  too  much  pride;  but  its 
quality  was  inoffensive;  it  was  not  of  that  sort 
which  hardens  the  heart,  and  serves  to  keep  inferiors 
at  a  distance ;  it  only  sought  to  ward  off  deroga- 
tion from  itself.  It  was  the  principle  of  self-respect 
carried  as  far  as  it  could  go,  without  infringing 
upon  that  respect,  which  he  would  have  every  one 
else  equally  maintain  for  himself.  He  would  have 
you  to  think  alike  with  him  on  this  topic.  Many  a 
quarrel  have  I  had  with  him,  when  we  were  rather 
older  boys,  and  our  tallness  made  us  more  obnox- 
ious to  observation  in  the  blue  clothes,  because  I 
would  not  thread  the  alleys  and  blind  ways  of  the 
town  with  him  to  elude  notice,  when  we  have  been 
out  together  on  a  holiday  in  the  streets  of  this  sneer- 
ing and  prying  metropolis.  W went,  sore  with 

these  notions,  to  Oxford,  where  the  dignity  and 
sweetness  of  a  scholar's  life,  meeting  with  the  alloy 
of  a  humble  introduction,  wrought  in  him  a  passion- 
ate devotion  to  the  place,  with  a  profound  aversion 
from  the  society.  The  servitor's  gown  (worse  than 
his  school  array)  clung  to  him  with  Nessian  venom. 
He  thought  himself  ridiculous  in  a  garb,  under 
which  Latimer  must  have  walked  erect,  and  in 
which  Hooker,  in  his  young  days,  possibly  flaunted 
in  a  vein  of  no  discommendable  vanity.  In  the 
depth  of  college  shades,  or  in  his  lonely  chamber, 
the  poor  student  shrunk  from  observation.  He 
found  shelter  among  books,  which  insult  not ;  and 
studies,  that  ask  no  questions  of  a  youth's  finances. 
He  was  lord  of  his  library,  and  seldom  cared  for 


io8  Best  English  Essays 

looking  out  beyond  his  domains.  The  healing  in- 
fluence of  studious  pursuits  was  upon  him  to  soothe 
and  to  abstract.  He  was  almost  a  healthy  man, 
when  the  waywardness  of  his  fate  broke  out  against 
him  with  a  second  and  worse  malignity.  The  father 
of  W had  hitherto  exercised  the  humble  pro- 
fession of  house-painter,  at  N ,  near  Oxford. 

A  supposed  interest  with  some  of  the  heads  of  col- 
leges had  now  induced  him  to  take  up  his  abode  in 
that  city,  with  the  hope  of  being  employed  upon 
some  public  works  which  were  talked  of.  From  that 
moment  I  read  in  the  countenance  of  the  young  man 
the  determination  which  at  length  tore  him  from 
academical  pursuits  for  ever.  To  a  person  unac- 
quainted with  our  universities,  the  distance  between 
the  gownsmen  and  the  townsmen,  as  they  are  called 
—  the  trading  part  of  the  latter  especially  —  is  car- 
ried to  an  excess  that  would  appear  harsh  and  in- 
credible. The  temperament  of  W 's  father  was 

diametrically  the  reverse  of  his  own.     Old  W 

was  a  little,  busy,  cringing  tradesman,  who,  with 
his  son  upon  his  arm,  would  stand  bowing  and 
scraping,  cap  in  hand,  to  anything  that  wore  the 
semblance  of  a  gown  —  insensible  to  the  winks  and 
opener  remonstrances  of  the  young  man,  to  whose 
chamber-fellow,  or  equal  in  standing,  perhaps,  he 
was  thus  obsequiously  and  gratuitously  ducking. 

Such  a  state  of  things  could  not  last.    W must 

change  the  air  of  Oxford,  or  be  suffocated.  He 
chose  the  former;  and  let  the  sturdy  moralist,  who 
strains  the  point  of  the  filial  duties  as  high  as  they 
can  bear,  censure  the  dereliction ;  he  cannot  esti- 
mate the  struggle.  I  stood  with  W ,  the  last 

afternoon  I  ever  saw  him,  under  the  eaves  of  his 


Lamb  109 

paternal  dwelling.  It  was  in  the  fine  lane  leading 
from  the  High  Street  to  the  back  of  col- 
lege, where  W kept  his  rooms.  He  seemed 

thoughtful  and  more  reconciled.  I  ventured  to  rally 
him  —  finding  him  in  a  better  mood  —  upon  a  rep- 
resentation of  the  Artist  Evangelist,  which  the  old 
man,  whose  affairs  were  beginning  to  flourish,  had 
caused  to  be  set  up  in  a  splendid  sort  of  frame  over 
his  really  handsome  shop,  either  as  a  token  of  pros- 
perity or  badge  of  gratitude  to  his  saint.  W 

looked  up  at  the  Luke,  and,  like  Satan,  "  knew  his 
mounted  sign  —  and  fled."  A  letter  on  his  father's 
table,  the  next  morning,  announced  that  he  had 
accepted  a  commission  in  a  regiment  about  to  em- 
bark for  Portugal.  He  was  among  the  first  who 
perished  before  the  walls  of  St.  Sebastian. 

I  do  not  know  how,  upon  a  subject  which  I  began 
with  treating  half  seriously,  I  should  have  fallen 
upon  a  recital  so  eminently  painful ;  but  this  theme 
of  poor  relationship  is  replete  with  so  much  matter 
for  tragic  as  well  as  comic  associations,  that  it  is 
difficult  to  keep  the  account  distinct  without  blend- 
ing. The  earliest  impressions  which  I  received  on 
this  matter  are  certainly  not  attended  with  anything 
painful,  or  very  humiliating,  in  the  recalling.  At 
my  father's  table  (no  very  splendid  one)  was  to  be 
found,  every  Saturday,  the  mysterious  figure  of  an 
aged  gentleman,  clothed  in  neat  black,  of  a  sad  yet 
comely  appearance.  His  deportment  was  of  the 
essence  of  gravity ;  his  words  few  or  none ;  and  I 
was  not  to  make  a  noise  in  his  presence.  I  had  little 
inclination  to  have  done  so  —  for  my  cue  was  to 
admire  in  silence.  A  particular  elbow-chair  was 
appropriated  to  him,  which  was  in  no  case  to  be 


no  Best  English  Essays 

violated.  A  peculiar  sort  of  sweet  pudding,  which 
appeared  on  no  other  occasion,  distinguished  the 
days  of  his  coming.  I  used  to  think  him  a  prodi- 
giously rich  man.  All  I  could  make  out  of  him  was, 
that  he  and  my  father  had  been  schoolfellows,  a 
world  ago,  at  Lincoln,  and  that  he  came  from  the 
Mint.  The  Mint  I  knew  to  be  a  place  where  all 
the  money  was  coined — and  I  thought  he  was  the 
owner  of  all  that  money.  Awful  ideas  of  the  Tower 
twined  themselves  about  his  presence.  He  seemed 
above  human  infirmities  and  passions.  A  sort  of 
melancholy  grandeur  invested  him.  From  some 
inexplicable  doom  I  fancied  him  obliged  to  go  about 
in  an  eternal  suit  of  mourning ;  a  captive  —  a  stately 
being  let  out  of  the  Tower  on  Saturdays.  Often 
have  I  wondered  at  the  temerity  of  my  father,  who, 
in  spite  of  an  habitual  general  respect  which  we  all 
in  common  manifested  towards  him,  would  venture 
now  and  then  to  stand  up  against  him  in  some  argu- 
ment touching  their  youthful  days.  The  houses  of 
the  ancient  city  of  Lincoln  are  divided  (as  most  of 
my  readers  know)  between  the  dwellers  on  the  hill 
and  in  the  valley.  This  marked  distinction  formed 
an  obvious  division  between  the  boys  who  lived 
above  (however  brought  together  in  a  common 
school)  and  the  boys  whose  paternal  residence  was 
on  the  plain  ;  a  sufficient  cause  of  hostility  in  the  code 
of  these  young  Grotiuses.  My  father  had  been  a 
leading  Mountaineer;  and  would  still  maintain  the 
general  superiority  in  skill  and  hardihood  of  the 
Above  Boys  (his  own  faction)  over  the  Beloiv  Boys 
(so  were  they  called),  of  which  party  his  contem- 
porary had  been  a  chieftain.  Many  and  hot  were 
the  skirmishes  on  this  topic  —  the  only  one  upon 


Lamb  1 1 1 

which  the  old  gentleman  was  ever  brought  out  — 
and  bad  blood  bred ;  even  sometimes  almost  to  the 
recommencement  (so  I  expected)  of  actual  hostili- 
ties. But  my  father,  who  scorned  to  insist  upon 
advantages,  generally  contrived  to  turn  the  conver- 
sation upon  some  adroit  by-commendation  of  the 
old  Minster;  in  the  general  preference  of  which, 
before  all  other  cathedrals  in  the  island,  the  dweller 
on  the  hill,  and  the  plain-born,  could  meet  on  a 
conciliating  level,  and  lay  down  their  less  important 
differences.  Once  only  I  saw  the  old  gentleman 
really  ruffled,  and  I  remember  with  anguish  the 
thought  that  came  over  me :  "  Perhaps  he  will  never 
come  here  again."  He  had  been  pressed  to  take 
another  plate  of  the  viand,  which  I  have  already 
mentioned  as  the  indispensable  concomitant  of  his 
visits.  He  had  refused  with  a  resistance  amounting 
to  rigor,  when  my  aunt,  an  old  Lincolnian,  but  who 
had  something  of  this,  in  common  with  my  cousin 
Bridget,  that  she  would  sometimes  press  civility 
out  of  season  —  uttered  the  following  memorable 
application  — "  Do  take  another  slice,  Mr.  Billet, 
for  you  do  not  get  pudding  every  day."  The  old 
gentleman  said  nothing  at  the  time  —  but  he  took 
occasion  in  the  course  of  the  evening,  when  some 
argument  had  intervened  between  them,  to  utter 
with  an  emphasis  which  chilled  the  company,  and 
which  chills  me  now  as  I  write  it  —  "  Woman,  you 
are  superannuated !  "  John  Billet  did  not  survive 
long,  after  the  digesting  of  this  affront;  but  he 
survived  long  enough  to  assure  me  that  peace  was 
actually  restored !  and  if  I  remember  aright,  an- 
other pudding  was  discreetly  substituted  in  the  place 
of  that  which  had  occasioned  the  offence.  He  died 


ii2  Best  English  Essays 

at  the  Mint  (anno  1781)  where  he  had  long  held, 
what  he  accounted,  a  comfortable  independence; 
and  with  five  pounds,  fourteen  shillings,  and  a 
penny,  which  were  found  in  his  escritoir  after  his 
decease,  left  the  world,  blessing  God  that  he  had 
enough  to  bury  him,  and  that  he  had  never  been 
obliged  to  any  man  for  a  sixpence.  This  was  — 
a  Poor  Relation. 


V 
DE    QJJINCEY 


DE    QUINCEY: 

INVENTOR   OF   MODERN   "IMPAS- 
SIONED  PROSE" 

PICTURE  to  yourself  a  shy  little  man,  with 
bright,  roving  eyes,  thin  features,  and 
many  of  the  physical  characteristics  of 
the  scholar;  give  this  man  a  luxuriant  imagina- 
tion, and  a  nervous  organization  that  seems  to 
require  such  a  stimulant  as  opium  in  excessive 
quantities,  make  him  a  writer,  —  and  you  have 
De  Quincey.  In  every  sense  of  the  word  he 
was  a  thorough  scholar,  as  witness  the  Latin  and 
Greek  quotations  scattered  through  his  writings 
and  seeming  an  inevitable  and  natural  part  of  his 
thinking;  a  brilliant  conversationist,  as  we  may 
gather  from  the  sparkling  humor  and  sly  wit  that 
make  their  way  into  nearly  all  his  work;  and, 
strangely  enough,  at  the  same  time  a  dreamer, 
though  in  De  Quincey  we  find  dreams  associated 
with  scholarly  accuracy  and  a  remarkable  power 
of  subtle  analysis.  Like  Lewis  Carroll,  he  had  all 
the  shyness  of  the  scholar.  He  therefore  takes 
refuge  in  the  anonymity  of  essay-writing,  where 
he  may  indulge  his  brilliant  conversational  power 
with  the  utmost  freedom.  De  Quincey' s  essays 
are  therefore  delightfully  conversational,  though 
they  are  the  product  of  the  solitary  imagination. 


n6  Best  English  Essays 

As  De  Quincey  through  a  somewhat  long  life 
gained  his  living  by  his  pen,  his  collected  works 
are  extremely  miscellaneous  in  character.  He 
was  an  excellent  critic,  a  sympathetic  biographical 
writer,  a  successful  producer  of  such  amusing 
literary  curiosities  as  his  essay  "  On  Murder  Con- 
sidered as  a  Fine  Art."  But  his  first  success,  and 
the  work  by  which  he  is  best  known,  is  his  "  Con- 
fessions of  an  English  Opium-Eater,"  in  which, 
in  his  description  of  his  opium  dreams,  he  gives 
us  the  first  examples  of  what  he  calls  "  impas- 
sioned prose."  Possibly  the  words  "  highly  im- 
aginative prose  "  would  describe  it  better.  It  was 
distinctly  prose  and  not  poetry,  since  the  writer 
never  cuts  loose  entirely  from  ground  facts ;  but 
it  exhibits  capabilities  of  prose  that  had  never 
before  been  suspected.  This  "  impassioned 
prose "  De  Quincey  seemed  always  to  consider 
his  most  valuable  contribution  to  literature,  and 
later  in  life  he  continued  the  "  Confessions  "  in 
a  sort  of  sequel  on  which  he  expended  his  most 
loving  care.  The  plan  of  this  sequel  was  never 
fully  carried  out ;  but  we  have  the  "  Suspiria  de 
Profundis"  and  "The  English  Mail  Coach"; 
the  former  of  which  contains  the  finest  specimen 
of  all  his  work,  according  to  Professor  Masson 
("Levana  and  Our  Ladies  of  Sorrow"),  the 
latter  his  most  extreme  example  of  lyrical  prose, 
namely,  the  "  Dream-Fugue  "  forming  Part  III. 
In  this  De  Quincey  attempts  nothing  less  than  the 
reproduction  of  the  effect  of  solemn  and  lofty 


De  Quincey  117 

music  by  mere  imaginative  description;  and  in. 
that  attempt  many  critics  think  that  De  Quincey 
was  not  wholly  successful;  but  it  is  interesting 
to  note  how  Richard  Wagner,  against  prolonged 
critical  hostility,  carried  to  success  in  actual  music 
the  imaginative  method  De  Quincey  here  uses  in 
language  description. 

While  the  "  Dream-Fugue  "  may  be  considered 
a  pure  opium  dream,  still  we  should  lose  the  point 
and  meaning  of  it  if  we  failed  to  note  how  every 
lyrical  image  in  this  part  of  the  composition  cor- 
responds to  a  prose  fact  in  the  first  and  second 
parts.  The  logical  relationship  is  perfect,  and  is 
elaborated  with  the  utmost  thought  and  care. 
Success  is  attained  by  self-restraint ;  it  is  freedom 
through  self-mastery  and  obedience  to  the  ever- 
lasting laws  of  thought  and  emotion  and  uni- 
versal truth.  This  is  lyrical  writing  that  attains 
its  success  in  mature  life,  not  in  youth  as  lyrical 
poetry  does,  and  not  only  genius  but  time  is 
required  for  its  perfection. 

De  Quincey's  ordinary  style,  seen  to  admirable 
advantage  in  the  first  parts  of  "  The  English 
Mail  Coach,"  is  graceful  and  sinuous  in  the  ex- 
treme, winding  in  and  out  through  a  complicated 
labyrinth,  yet  without  ever  losing  the  clue  of  the 
thought,  or  becoming  for  a  moment  obscure,  or 
being  betrayed  into  the  slightest  awkwardness; 
and  when  we  come  to  the  "  Dream-Fugue  "  we 
think  of  the  musician  passionately  devoted  to  his 
musical  art  who  steals  into  the  organ  loft  when  he 


n8  Best  English  Essays 

knows  that  but  one  or  two  chance  devotees  are 
listening  in  the  empty  cathedral,  and  pours  forth 
his  most  triumphant  chords.  "  Levana  and  Our 
Ladies  of  Sorrow  "  is  in  a  more  subdued  and 
subtle  key,  more  delicately  artistic,  more  perfect; 
yet  we  could  hardly  understand  it  on  a  first  read- 
ing were  we  not  prepared  for  it  by  the  more 
obvious  "  Mail  Coach." 


THE   ENGLISH    MAIL   COACH 

IN  the  Preface  to  the  volume  of  his  collected 
works  containing  "  The  English  Mail  Coach," 
De  Quincey  gave  a  brief  explanation  of  his  design. 
After  summarizing  the  facts  given  at  length  in  the 
second  section,  entitled  "  The  Vision  of  Sudden 
Death,"  he  goes  on  as  follows :  "  But  a  movement 
of  horror,  and  of  spontaneous  recoil  from  the  dread- 
ful scene,  naturally  carried  the  whole  of  that  scene, 
raised  and  idealised,  into  my  dreams,  and  very 
soon  into  a  rolling  succession  of  dreams.  The  actual 
scene,  as  looked  down  upon  from  the  box  of  the 
mail,  was  transformed  into  a  dream,  as  tumultuous 
and  changing  as  a  musical  fugue.  This  troubled 
dream  is  circumstantially  reported  in  Section  the 
Third,  entitled  '  Dream-Fugue  on  the  Theme  of 
Sudden  Death.'" 

The  first  section  —  "  The  Glory  of  Motion  "  — 
was  a  general  discursive  essay  on  the  English  mail 
coach  and  the  pleasures  and  observations  incident 
to  riding  upon  the  top  of  it.  It  formed  nearly  half 
of  the  whole  work.  Of  this  De  Quincey  says : 


De  Quincey  119 

"  What  I  had  beheld  from  my  seat  upon  the  mail, 
—  the  scenical  strife  of  action  and  passion,  of 
anguish  and  fear,  as  I  had  there  witnessed  them 
moving  in  ghostly  silence,  —  this  duel  between  life 
and  death  narrowing  itself  to  a  point  of  such  ex- 
quisite evanescence  as  the  collision  neared:  all 
these  elements  of  the  scene  blended,  under  the  law 
of  association,  with  the  previous  and  permanent 
features  of  distinction  investing  the  mail  itself ; 
which  features  at  that  time  lay  —  first,  in  velocity 
unprecedented;  secondly,  in  the  power  and  beauty 
of  the  horses;  thirdly,  in  the  official  connection 
with  the  government  of  a  great  nation;  and, 
fourthly,  in  the  function,  almost  a  consecrated  func- 
tion, of  publishing  and  diffusing  through  the  land 
the  great  political  events,  and  especially  the  great 
battles,  during  a  conflict  of  unparalleled  grandeur. 
These  honorary  distinctions  are  all  described  cir- 
cumstantially in  the  first  or  introductory  section  — 
'  The  Glory  of  Motion.'  The  three  first  were  dis- 
tinctions maintained  at  all  times;  but  the  fourth 
and  grandest  belonged  exclusively  to  the  war  with 
Napoleon ;  and  this  it  was  which  most  naturally 
introduced  Waterloo  into  the  dream.  ...  So  far 
as  I  know,  every  element  in  the  shifting  movements 
of  the  Dream  derived  itself  either  primarily  from 
the  incidents  of  the  actual  scene,  or  from  secondary 
features  associated  with  the  mail.  For  example,  the 
cathedral  aisle  derived  itself  from  the  mimic  com- 
bination of  features  which  grouped  themselves 
together  at  the  point  of  collision  —  namely,  an 
arrow-like  section  of  the  road,  six  hundred  yards 
long,  under  the  solemn  lights  described,  with  lofty 
trees  meeting  overhead  in  arches.  The  guard's 


I2O  Best  English  Essays 

horn,  again  —  3  humble  instrument  in  itself  —  was 
yet  glorified  as  the  organ  of  publication  for  so  many 
great  national  events.  And  the  incident  of  the 
Dying  Trumpeter,  who  rises  from  a  marble  bas- 
relief,  and  carries  a  marble  trumpet  to  his  marble 
lips  for  the  purpose  of  warning  the  female  infant, 
was  doubtless  secretly  suggested  by  my  own  imper- 
fect effort  to  seize  the  guard's  horn,  and  to  blow 
a  warning  blast.  But  the  Dream  knows  best ;  and 
the  Dream,  I  say  again,  is  the  responsible  party." 
In  addition  to  the  items  mentioned  by  De  Quincey 
as  especially  influencing  his  Dream,  two  specific 
instances  of  observations  described  in  "  The  Glory 
of  Motion  "  are  worked  into  the  Dream,  and  are 
here  reprinted  complete. 


SECTION  I  —  THE  GLORY  OF  MOTION 

How  else,  for  example,  than  as  a  constant 
watcher  for  the  dawn,  and  for  the  London  mail 
that  in  summer  months  entered  about  daybreak 
amongst  the  lawny  thickets  of  Marlborough  forest, 
couldst  thou,  sweet  Fanny  of  the  Bath  road,  have 
become  the  glorified  inmate  of  my  dreams?  Yet 
Fanny,  as  the  loveliest  young  woman  for  face  and 
person  that  perhaps  in  my  whole  life  I  have  beheld, 
merited  the  station  which  even  now,  from  a  distance 
of  forty  years,  she  holds  in  my  dreams  ;  yes,  though 
by  links  of  natural  association  she  brings  along  with 
her  a  troop  of  dreadful  creatures,  fabulous  and  not 
fabulous,  that  are  more  abominable  to  the  heart 
than  Fanny  and  the  dawn  are  delightful. 


De  Quincey  121 

Miss  Fanny  of  the  Bath  road,  strictly  speaking, 
lived  at  a  mile's  distance  from  that  road,  but  came 
so  continually  to  meet  the  mail  that  I  on  my  fre- 
quent transits  rarely  missed  her,  and  naturally  con- 
nected her  image  with  the  great  thoroughfare  where 
only  I  had  ever  seen  her.  Why  she  came  so  punctu- 
ally I  do  not  exactly  know ;  but  I  believe  with  some 
burden  of  commissions,  to  be  executed  in  Bath, 
which  had  gathered  to  her  own  residence  as  a  cen- 
tral rendezvous  for  converging  them.  The  mail- 
coachman  who  drove  the  Bath  mail  and  wore  the 
royal  livery  happened  to  be  Fanny's  grandfather. 
A  good  man  he  was,  that  loved  his  beautiful  grand- 
daughter, and,  loving  her  wisely,  was  vigilant  over 
her  deportment  in  any  case  where  young  Oxford 
might  happen  to  be  concerned.  Did  my  vanity 
then  suggest  that  I  myself,  individually,  could  fall 
within  the  line  of  his  terrors?  Certainly  not,  as 
regarded  any  physical  pretensions  that  I  could 
plead;  for  Fanny  (as  a  chance  passenger  from  her 
own  neighbourhood  once  told  me)  counted  in  her 
train  a  hundred  and  ninety-nine  professed  admirers, 
if  not  open  aspirants  to  her  favour ;  and  probably  not 
one  of  the  whole  brigade  but  excelled  myself  in  per- 
sonal advantages.  Ulysses  even,  with  the  unfair 
advantage  of  his  accursed  bow,  could  hardly  have 
undertaken  that  amount  of  suitors.  So  the  danger 
might  have  seemed  slight  —  only  that  woman  is 
universally  aristocratic;  it  is  amongst  her  nobilities 
of  heart  that  she  is  so.  Now,  the  aristocratic  dis- 
tinctions in  my  favour  might  easily  with  Miss 
Fanny  have  compensated  my  physical  deficiencies. 
Did  I  then  make  love  to  Fanny  ?  Why,  yes ;  about 
as  much  love  as  one  could  make  whilst  the  mail  was 


122  Best  English  Essays 

changing  horses  —  a  process  which,  ten  years  later, 
did  not  occupy  above  eighty  seconds ;  but  then,  — 
viz.  about  Waterloo  —  it  occupied  five  times  eighty. 
Now,  four  hundred  seconds  offer  a  field  quite  ample 
enough  for  whispering  into  a  young  woman's  ear  a 
great  deal  of  truth,  and  (by  way  of  parenthesis) 
some  trifle  of  falsehood.  Grandpapa  did  right, 
therefore,  to  watch  me.  And  yet,  as  happens  too 
often  to  the  grandpapas  of  earth  in  a  contest  with 
the  admirers  of  granddaughters,  how  vainly  would 
he  have  watched  me  had  I  meditated  any  evil  whis- 
pers to  Fanny!  She,  it  is  my  belief,  would  have 
protected  herself  against  any  man's  evil  suggestions. 
But  he,  as  the  result  showed,  could  not  have  inter- 
cepted the  opportunities  for  such  suggestions.  Yet, 
why  not?  Was  he  not  active?  Was  he  not  bloom- 
ing? Blooming  he  was  as  Fanny  herself. 

"  Say,  all  our  praises  why  should  lords " 

Stop,  that 's  not  the  line. 

"  Say,  all  our  roses  why  should  girls  engross  ?  " 

The  coachman  showed  rosy  blossoms  on  his  face 
deeper  even  than  his  granddaughter's  —  his  being 
drawn  from  the  ale-cask,  Fanny's  from  the  foun- 
tains of  the  dawn.  But,  in  spite  of  his  blooming 
face,  some  infirmities  he  had ;  and  one  particularly 
in  which  he  too  much  resembled  a  crocodile.  This 
lay  in  a  monstrous  inaptitude  for  turning  round. 
The  crocodile,  I  presume,  owes  that  inaptitude  to 
the  absurd  length  of  his  back ;  but  in  our  grandpapa 
it  arose  rather  from  the  absurd  breadth  of  his  back, 
combined,  possibly,  with  some  growing  stiffness  in 


De  Quincey  123 

his  legs.  Now,  upon  this  crocodile  infirmity  of  his 
I  planted  a  human  advantage  for  tendering  my 
homage  to  Miss  Fanny.  In  defiance  of  all  his  hon- 
ourable vigilance,  no  sooner  had  he  presented  to  us 
his  mighty  Jovian  back  (what  a  field  for  displaying 
to  mankind  his  royal  scarlet!),  whilst  inspecting 
professionally  the  buckles,  the  straps,  and  the  silvery 
turrets  of  his  harness,  than  I  raised  Miss  Fanny's 
hand  to  my  lips,  and,  by  the  mixed  tenderness  and 
respectfulness  of  my  manner,  caused  her  easily  to 
understand  how  happy  it  would  make  me  to  rank 
upon  her  list  as  No.  10  or  12:  in  which  case  a  few 
casualties  amongst  her  lovers  (and,  observe,  they 
hanged  liberally  in  those  days)  might  have  pro- 
moted me  speedily  to  the  top  of  the  tree ;  as,  on  the 
other  hand,  with  how  much  loyalty  of  submission 
I  acquiesced  by  anticipation  in  her  award,  supposing 
that  she  should  plant  me  in  the  very  rearward  of 
her  favor,  as  No.  199  -(-  I.  Most  truly  I  loved  this 
beautiful  and  ingenuous  girl ;  and,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  Bath  mail,  timing  all  courtships  by  post- 
office  allowance,  heaven  only  knows  what  might 
have  come  of  it.  People  talk  of  being  over  head 
and  ears  in  love ;  now,  the  mail  was  the  cause  that 
I  sank  only  over  ears  in  love,  —  which,  you  know, 
still  left  a  trifle  of  brain  to  overlook  the  whole  con- 
duct of  the  affair. 

Ah,  reader!  when  I  look  back  upon  those  days, 
it  seems  to  me  that  all  things  change  —  all  things 
perish.  "  Perish  the  roses  and  the  palms  of  kings  "  : 
perish  even  the  crowns  and  trophies  of  Waterloo: 
thunder  and  lightning  are  not  the  thunder  and 
lightning  which  I  remember.  Roses  are  degenerat- 
ing. The  Fannies  of  our  island — though  this  I  say 


124  Best  English  Essays 

with  reluctance  —  are  not  visibly  improving;  and 
the  Bath  road  is  notoriously  superannuated.  Croc- 
odiles, you  will  say,  are  stationary.  Mr.  Waterton 
tells  me  that  the  crocodile  does  not  change,  —  that 
a  cayman,  in  fact,  or  an  alligator,  is  just  as  good  for 
riding  upon  as  he  was  in  the  time  of  the  Pharaohs. 
That  may  be;  but  the  reason  is  that  the  crocodile 
does  not  live  fast  —  he  is  a  slow  coach.  I  believe  it 
is  generally  understood  among  naturalists  that  the 
crocodile  is  a  blockhead.  It  is  my  own  impression 
that  the  Pharaohs  were  also  blockheads.  Now,  as 
the  Pharaohs  and  the  crocodile  domineered  over 
Egyptian  society,  this  accounts  for  a  singular  mis- 
take that  prevailed  through  innumerable  genera- 
tions on  the  Nile.  The  crocodile  made  the  ridiculous 
blunder  of  supposing  man  to  be  meant  chiefly  for 
his  own  eating.  Man,  taking  a  different  view  of  the 
subject,  naturally  met  that  mistake  by  another:  he 
viewed  the  crocodile  as  a  thing  sometimes  to  wor- 
ship, but  always  to  run  away  from.  And  this 
continued  till  Mr.  Waterton  changed  the  relations 
between  the  animals.  The  mode  of  escaping  from 
the  reptile  he  showed  to  be  not  by  running  away,  but 
by  leaping  on  its  back  booted  and  spurred.  The 
two  animals  had  misunderstood  each  other.  The  use 
of  the  crocodile  has  now  been  cleared  up — viz.  to  be 
ridden;  and  the  final  cause  of  man  is  that  he  may 
improve  the  health  of  the  crocodile  by  riding  him 
a-foxhunting  before  breakfast.  And  it  is  pretty 
certain  that  any  crocodile  who  has  been  regularly 
hunted  through  the  season,  and  is  master  of  the 
weight  he  carries,  will  take  a  six-barred  gate  now  as 
well  as  ever  he  would  have  done  in  the  infancy  of 
the  pyramids. 


De  Quincey  125 

If,  therefore,  the  crocodile  does  not  change,  all 
things  else  undeniably  do:  even  the  shadow  of  the 
pyramids  grows  less.  And  often  the  restoration  in 
vision  of  Fanny  and  the  Bath  road  makes  me  too 
pathetically  sensible  of  that  truth.  Out  of  the  dark- 
ness, if  I  happen  to  call  back  the  image  of  Fanny, 
up  rises  suddenly  from  a  gulf  of  forty  years  a  rose 
in  June;  or,  if  I  think  for  an  instant  of  the  rose  in 
June,  up  rises  the  heavenly  face  of  Fanny.  One 
after  the  other,  like  the  antiphonies  in  the  choral 
service,  rise  Fanny  and  the  rose  in  June,  then 
back  again  the  rose  in  June  and  Fanny.  Then  come 
both  together,  as  in  a  chorus  —  roses  and  Fannies, 
Fannies  and  roses,  without  end,  thick  as  blossoms 
in  paradise.  Then  comes  a  venerable  crocodile,  in 
a  royal  livery  of  scarlet  and  gold,  with  sixteen 
capes;  and  the  crocodile  is  driving  four-in-hand 
from  the  box  of  the  Bath  mail.  And  suddenly  we 
upon  the  mail  are  pulled  up  by  a  mighty  dial,  sculp- 
tured with  the  hours,  that  mingle  with  the  heavens 
and  the  heavenly  host.  Then  all  at  once  we  are 
arrived  at  Marlborough  forest,  amongst  the  lovely 
households  of  the  roe-deer;  the  deer  and  their 
fawns  retire  into  the  dewy  thickets ;  the  thickets  are 
rich  with  roses ;  once  again  the  roses  call  up  the 
sweet  countenance  of  Fanny;  and  she,  being  the 
granddaughter  of  a  crocodile,  awakens  a  dreadful 
host  of  semi-legendary  animals  —  griffins,  dragons, 
basilisks,  sphinxes  —  till  at  length  the  whole  vision 
of  fighting  images  crowds  into  one  towering  ar- 
morial shield,  a  vast  emblazonry  of  human  charities 
and  human  loveliness  that  have  perished,  but  quar- 
tered heraldically  with  unutterable  and  demoniac 
natures,  whilst  over  all  rises,  as  a  surmounting  crest, 


126  Best  English  Essays 

one  fair  female  hand,  with  the  forefinger  pointing, 
in  sweet,  sorrowful  admonition,  upwards  to  heaven, 
where  is  sculptured  the  eternal  writing  which  pro- 
claims the  frailty  of  earth  and  her  children. 


But  the  grandest  chapter  of  our  experience  within 
the  whole  mail-coach  service  was  on  those  occasions 
when  we  went  down  from  London  with  the  news 
of  victory.  .  .  .  The  night  before  us  is  a  night  of 
victory ;  and,  behold !  to  the  ordinary  display  what 
a  heart-shaking  addition !  —  horses,  men,  carriages, 
all  are  dressed  in  laurels  and  flowers,  oak-leaves 
and  ribbons.  .  .  .  One  heart,  one  pride,  one  glory, 
connects  every  man  by  the  transcendent  bond  of  his 
national  blood.  The  spectators,  who  are  numerous 
beyond  precedent,  express  their  sympathy  with  these 
fervent  feelings  by  continual  hurrahs.  .  .  .  Horses ! 
can  these  be  horses,  that  bound  off  with  the  action 
and  gestures  of  leopards  ?  What  stir !  —  what  sea- 
like  ferment !  —  what  a  thundering  of  wheels  !  — 
what  trampling  of  hoofs !  —  what  a  sounding  of 
trumpets !  —  what  farewell  cheers  —  what  redou- 
bling peals  of  brotherly  congratulation,  connecting 
the  name  of  the  particular  mail  —  "  Liverpool  for 
ever ! "  —  with  the  name  of  the  particular  vic- 
tory— "  Badajoz  for  ever!"  or  "Salamanca  for 
ever !  " 

The  people  they  met  were  variously  affected. 
Some  thought  only  of  the  joy  of  victory ;  some  were 
overwhelmed  with  sadness  to  think  what  ill  fate 
might  have  overtaken  their  own  sons  and  brothers 
in  the  ranks. 


De  Quincey  127 

Every  joy,  however,  even  rapturous  joy  —  such  is 
the  sad  law  of  earth  —  may  carry  with  it  grief,  or 
fear  of  grief,  to  some.  Three  miles  beyond  Barnet, 
we  see  approaching  us  another  private  carriage, 
nearly  repeating  the  circumstances  of  the  former 
case.  Here,  also,  the  glasses  are  all  down;  here, 
also,  is  an  elderly  lady  seated ;  but  the  two  daughters 
are  missing ;  for  the  single  young  person  sitting  by 
the  lady's  side  seems  to  be  an  attendant  —  so  I  judge 
from  her  dress,  and  her  air  of  respectful  reserve. 
The  lady  is  in  mourning;  and  her  countenance 
expresses  sorrow.  At  first  she  does  not  look  up; 
so  that  I  believe  she  is  not  aware  of  our  approach, 
until  she  hears  the  measured  beating  of  our  horses' 
hoofs.  Then  she  raises  her  eyes  to  settle  them  pain- 
fully on  our  triumphal  equipage.  Our  decorations 
explain  the  case  to  her  at  once;  but  she  beholds 
them  with  apparent  anxiety,  or  even  with  terror. 
Some  time  before  this,  I,  finding  it  difficult  to  hit 
a  flying  mark  when  embarrassed  by  the  coachman's 
person  and  reins  intervening,  had  given  to  the  guard 
a  "  Courier  "  evening  paper,  containing  the  gazette, 
for  the  next  carriage  that  might  pass.  Accordingly 
he  tossed  it  in,  so  folded  that  the  huge  capitals  ex- 
pressing some  such  legend  as  GLORIOUS  VICTORY 
might  catch  the  eye  at  once.  To  see  the  paper,  how- 
ever, at  all,  interpreted  as  it  was  by  our  ensigns  of 
triumph,  explained  everything;  and,  if  the  guard 
were  right  in  thinking  the  lady  to  have  received  it 
with  a  gesture  of  horror,  it  could  not  be  doubtful 
that  she  had  suffered  some  deep  personal  affliction 
in  connection  with  this  Spanish  war. 

Here,  now,  was  the  case  of  one  who,  having  for- 
merly suffered,  might,  erroneously  perhaps,  be  dis- 


128  Best  English  Essays 

tressing  herself  with  anticipations  of  another  similar 
suffering.  That  same  night,  and  hardly  three  hours 
later,  occurred  the  reverse  case.  A  poor  woman, 
who  too  probably  would  find  herself,  in  a  day  or  two, 
to  have  suffered  the  heaviest  of  afflictions  by  the 
battle,  blindly  allowed  herself  to  express  an  exul- 
tation so  unmeasured  in  the  news  and  its  details  as 
gave  to  her  the  appearance  which  amongst  Celtic 
Highlanders  is  called  fey.1  This  was  at  some  little 
town  where  we  changed  horses  an  hour  or  two  after 
midnight.  Some  fair  or  wake  had  kept  the  people 
up  out  of  their  beds,  and  had  occasioned  a  partial 
illumination  of  the  stalls  and  booths,  presenting  an 
unusual  but  very  impressive  effect.  We  saw  many 
lights  moving  about  as  we  drew  near ;  and  perhaps 
the  most  striking  scene  on  the  whole  route  was  our 
reception  at  this  place.  The  flashing  of  torches  and 
the  beautiful  radiance  of  blue  lights  (technically, 
Bengal  lights)  upon  the  heads  of  our  horses;  the 
fine  effect  of  such  a  showery  and  ghostly  illumina- 
tion falling  upon  our  flowers  and  glittering  laurels ; 
whilst  all  around  ourselves,  that  formed  a  centre  of 
light,  the  darkness  gathered  on  the  rear  and  flanks 
in  massy  blackness:  these  optical  splendors,  to- 
gether with  the  prodigious  enthusiasm  of  the  people, 
composed  a  picture  at  once  scenical  and  affecting, 
theatrical  and  holy.  As  we  stayed  for  three  or  four 
minutes,  I  alighted;  and  immediately  from  a  dis- 
mantled stall  in  the  street,  where  no  doubt  she  had 
been  presiding  through  the  earlier  part  of  the  night, 
advanced  eagerly  a  middle-aged  woman.  The  sight 
of  my  newspaper  it  was  that  had  drawn  her  atten- 
tion upon  myself.  The  victory  which  we  were 

1  Fey,  fated,  doomed  to  die. 


De  Quincey  129 

carrying  down  to  the  provinces  on  this  occasion  was 
the  imperfect  one  of  Talavera  —  imperfect  for  its 
results,  such  was  the  virtual  treachery  of  the  Span- 
ish general,  Cuesta,  but  not  imperfect  in  its  ever- 
memorable  heroism.  I  told  her  the  main  outline  of 
the  battle.  The  agitation  of  her  enthusiasm  had 
been  so  conspicuous  when  listening,  and  when  first 
applying  for  information,  that  I  could  not  but  ask 
her  if  she  had  not  some  relative  in  the  Peninsular 
army.  Oh,  yes ;  her  only  son  was  there.  In  what 
regiment?  He  was  a  trooper  in  the  23d  Dragoons. 
My  heart  sank  within  me  as  she  made  that  answer. 
This  sublime  regiment,  which  an  Englishman  should 
never  mention  without  raising  his  hat  to  their 
memory,  had  made  the  most  memorable  and  effec- 
tive charge  recorded  in  military  annals.  They 
leaped  their  horses  —  over  a  trench  where  they 
could ;  into  it,  and  with  the  result  of  death  or  mu- 
tilation, when  they  could  not.  What  proportion 
cleared  the  trench  is  nowhere  stated.  Those  who 
did  closed  up  and  went  down  upon  the  enemy  with 
such  divinity  of  fervour  (I  use  the  word  divinity  by 
design :  the  inspiration  of  God  must  have  prompted 
this  movement  to  those  whom  even  then  He  was 
calling  to  His  presence)  that  two  results  followed. 
As  regarded  the  enemy,  this  23d  Dragoons,  not,  I 
believe,  originally  three  hundred  and  fifty  strong, 
paralysed  a  French  column  six  thousand  strong, 
then  ascended  the  hill,  and  fixed  the  gaze  of  the 
whole  French  army.  As  regarded  themselves,  the 
23d  were  supposed  at  first  to  have  been  barely  not 
annihilated ;  but  eventually,  I  believe,  about  one  in 
four  survived.  And  this,  then,  was  the  regiment  — 
a  regiment  already  for  some  hours  glorified  and 

9 


130  Best  English  Essays 

hallowed  to  the  ear  of  all  London,  as  lying  stretched, 
by  a  large  majority,  upon  one  bloody  aceldama  — 
in  which  the  young  trooper  served  whose  mother 
was  now  talking  in  a  spirit  of  such  joyous  enthusi- 
asm. Did  I  tell  her  the  truth  ?  Had  I  the  heart  to 
break  up  her  dreams?  No.  To-morrow,  said  I  to 
myself  —  to-morrow,  or  the  next  day,  will  publish 
the  worst.  For  one  night  more  wherefore  should 
she  not  sleep  in  peace  ?  After  to-morrow  the  chances 
are  too  many  that  peace  will  forsake  her  pillow. 
This  brief  respite,  then,  let  her  owe  to  my  gift  and 
my  forbearance.  But,  if  I  told  her  not  of  the  bloody 
price  that  had  been  paid,  not  therefore  was  I  silent 
on  the  contributions  from  her  son's  regiment  to  that 
day's  service  and  glory.  I  showed  her  not  the  fu- 
neral banners  under  which  the  noble  regiment  was 
sleeping.  I  lifted  not  the  overshadowing  laurels 
from  the  bloody  trench  in  which  horse  and  rider 
lay  mangled  together.  But  I  told  her  how  these 
dear  children  of  England,  officers  and  privates,  had 
leaped  their  horses  over  all  obstacles  as  gaily  as 
hunters  to  the  morning's  chase.  I  told  her  how  they 
rode  their  horses  into  the  mists  of  death,  —  saying 
to  myself,  but  not  saying  to  her,  "  and  laid  down 
their  young  lives  for  thee,  O  mother  England !  as 
willingly  —  poured  out  their  noble  blood  as  cheer- 
fully—  as  ever,  after  a  long  day's  sport,  when  in- 
fants, they  had  rested  their  wearied  heads  upon  their 
mother's  knees,  or  had  sunk  to  sleep  in  her  arms." 
Strange  it  is,  yet  true,  that  she  seemed  to  have  no 
fears  for  her  son's  safety,  even  after  this  knowledge 
that  the  23d  Dragoons  had  been  memorably  en- 
gaged ;  but  so  much  was  she  enraptured  by  the 
knowledge  that  his  regiment,  and  therefore  that  he, 


De  Quincey  131 

had  rendered  conspicuous  service  in  the  dreadful 
conflict  —  a  service  which  had  actually  made  them, 
within  the  last  twelve  hours,  the  foremost  topic  of 
conversation  in  London  —  so  absolutely  was  fear 
swallowed  up  in  joy  —  that,  in  the  mere  simplicity 
of  her  fervent  nature,  the  poor  woman  threw  her 
arms  round  my  neck,  as  she  thought  of  her  son,  and 
gave  to  me  the  kiss  which  secretly  was  meant  for 
him. 

SECTION   II  —  THE  VISION   OF  SUDDEN   DEATH 

WHAT  is  to  be  taken  as  the  predominant  opinion 
of  man,  reflective  and  philosophic,  upon  SUDDEN 
DEATH  ?  It  is  remarkable  that,  in  different  condi- 
tions of  society,  sudden  death  has  been  variously 
regarded  as  the  consummation  of  an  earthly  career 
most  fervently  to  be  desired,  or,  again,  as  that  con- 
summation which  is  with  most  horror  to  be  depre- 
cated. Csesar  the  Dictator,  at  his  last  dinner-party 
(ccena),  on  the  very  evening  before  his  assassina- 
tion, when  the  minutes  of  his  earthly  career  were 
numbered,  being  asked  what  death,  in  his  judgment, 
might  be  pronounced  the  most  eligible,  replied 
"  That  which  should  be  most  sudden."  On  the  other 
hand,  the  divine  Litany  of  our  English  Church, 
when  breathing  forth  supplications,  as  if  in  some 
representative  character,  for  the  whole  human  race 
prostrate  before  God,  places  such  a  death  in  the  very 
van  of  horrors :  "  From  lightning  and  tempest ; 
from  plague,  pestilence,  and  famine;  from  battle 
and  murder,  and  from  SUDDEN  DEATH  —  Good  Lord, 
deliver  us."  Sudden  death  is  here  made  to  crown 
the  climax  in  a  grand  ascent  of  calamities;  it  is 


132  Best  English  Essays 

ranked  among  the  last  of  curses;  and  yet  by  the 
noblest  of  Romans  it  was  ranked  as  the  first  of 
blessings.  In  that  difference  most  readers  will  see 
little  more  than  the  essential  difference  between 
Christianity  and  Paganism.  But  this,  on  consider- 
ation, I  doubt.  The  Christian  Church  may  be  right 
in  its  estimate  of  sudden  death ;  and  it  is  a  natural 
feeling,  though  after  all  it  may  also  be  an  infirm 
one,  to  wish  for  a  quiet  dismissal  from  life,  as  that 
which  seems  most  reconcilable  with  meditation,  with 
penitential  retrospects,  and  with  the  humilities  of 
farewell  prayer.  There  does  not,  however,  occur  to 
me  any  direct  scriptural  warrant  for  this  earnest 
petition  of  the  English  Litany,  unless  under  a 
special  construction  of  the  word  "  sudden."  It 
seems  a  petition  indulged  rather  and  conceded  to 
human  infirmity  than  exacted  from  human  piety. 
It  is  not  so  much  a  doctrine  built  upon  the  eternities 
of  the  Christian  system  as  a  plausible  opinion  built 
upon  special  varieties  of  physical  temperament.  Let 
that,  however,  be  as  it  may,  two  remarks  suggest 
themselves  as  prudent  restraints  upon  a  doctrine 
which  else  may  wander,  and  has  wandered,  into  an 
uncharitable  superstition.  The  first  is  this:  that 
many  people  are  likely  to  exaggerate  the  horror  of 
a  sudden  death  from  the  disposition  to  lay  a  false 
stress  upon  words  or  acts  simply  because  by  an  acci- 
dent they  have  become  final  words  or  acts.  If  a 
man  dies,  for  instance,  by  some  sudden  death  when 
he  happens  to  be  intoxicated,  such  a  death  is  falsely 
regarded  with  peculiar  horror;  as  though  the  in- 
toxication were  suddenly  exalted  into  a  blasphemy. 
But  that  is  unphilosophic.  The  man  was,  or  he  was 
not,  habitually  a  drunkard.  If  not,  if  his  intoxi- 


De  Quincey  133 

cation  were  a  solitary  accident,  there  can  be  no 
reason  for  allowing  special  emphasis  to  this  act 
simply  because  through  misfortune  it  became  his 
final  act.  Nor,  on  the  other  hand,  if  it  were  no 
accident,  but  one  of  his  habitual  transgressions,  will 
it  be  the  more  habitual  or  the  more  a  transgression 
because  some  sudden  calamity,  surprising  him,  has 
caused  this  habitual  transgression  to  be  also  a  final 
one.  Could  the  man  have  had  any  reason  even  dimly 
to  foresee  his  own  sudden  death,  there  would  have 
been  a  new  feature  in  his  act  of  intemperance  —  a 
feature  of  presumption  and  irreverence,  as  in  one 
that,  having  known  himself  drawing  near  to  the 
presence  of  God,  should  have  suited  his  demeanour 
to  an  expectation  so  awful.  But  this  is  no  part  of 
the  case  supposed.  And  the  only  new  element  in 
the  man's  act  is  not  any  element  of  special  immor- 
ality, but  simply  of  special  misfortune. 

The  other  remark  has  reference  to  the  meaning  of 
the  word  sudden.  Very  possibly  Caesar  and  the 
Christian  Church  do  not  differ  in  the  way  supposed, 
—  that  is,  do  not  differ  by  any  difference  of  doctrine 
as  between  Pagan  and  Christian  views  of  the  moral 
temper  appropriate  to  death ;  but  perhaps  they  are 
contemplatirg  different  cases.  Both  contemplate  a 
violent  death,  a  Btatfavaros  —  death  that  is  ySiatos, 
or,  in  other  words,  death  that  is  brought  about,  not 
by  internal  and  spontaneous  change,  but  by  active 
force  having  its  origin  from  without.1  In  this  mean- 
ing the  two  authorities  agree.  Thus  far  they  are  in 
harmony.  But  the  difference  is  that  the  Roman  by 
the  word  "  sudden "  means  unlingering,  whereas 

1  Biaios,  Greek  for  "  forcible  "  or  "  violent " :  hence  Biathana- 
tos,  violent  death. 


134  Best  English  Essays 

the  Christian  Litany  by  "  sudden  death  "  means  a 
death  without  warning,  consequently  without  any 
available  summons  to  religious  preparation.  The 
poor  mutineer  who  kneels  down  to  gather  into  his 
heart  the  bullets  from  twelve  firelocks  of  his  pitying 
comrades  dies  by  a  most  sudden  death  in  Caesar's 
sense;  one  shock,  one  mighty  spasm,  one  (possibly 
not  one)  groan,  and  all  is  over.  But,  in  the  sense 
of  the  Litany,  the  mutineer's  death  is  far  from  sud- 
den :  his  offence  originally,  his  imprisonment,  his 
trial,  the  interval  between  his  sentence  and  its 
execution,  having  all  furnished  him  with  separate 
warnings  of  his  fate  —  having  all  summoned  him 
to  meet  it  with  solemn  preparation. 

Here  at  once,  in  this  sharp  verbal  distinction,  we 
comprehend  the  faithful  earnestness  with  which  a 
holy  Christian  Church  pleads  on  behalf  of  her  poor 
departing  children  that  God  would  vouchsafe  to 
them  the  last  great  privilege  and  distinction  possible 
on  a  death-bed,  viz.  the  opportunity  of  untroubled 
preparation  for  facing  this  mighty  trial.  Sudden 
death,  as  a  mere  variety  in  the  modes  of  dying  where 
death  in  some  shape  is  inevitable,  proposes  a  ques- 
tion of  choice  which,  equally  in  the  Roman  and 
the  Christian  sense,  will  be  variously  answered  ac- 
cording to  each  man's  variety  of  temperament. 
Meantime,  one  aspect  of  sudden  death  there  is,  one 
modification,  upon  which  no  doubt  can  arise,  that  of 
all  martyrdoms  it  is  the  most  agitating  —  viz.  where 
it  surprises  a  man  under  circumstances  which  offer 
(or  which  seem  to  offer)  some  hurrying,  flying, 
inappreciably  minute  chance  of  evading  it.  Sudden 
as  the  danger  which  it  affronts  must  be  any  effort 
by  which  such  an  evasion  can  be  accomplished. 


De  Quincey  135 

Even  that,  even  the  sickening  necessity  for  hurrying 
in  extremity  where  all  hurry  seems  destined  to  be 
vain,  —  even  that  anguish  is  liable  to  a  hideous  ex- 
asperation in  one  particular  case:  viz.  where  the 
appeal  is  made  not  exclusively  to  the  instinct  of  self- 
preservation,  but  to  the  conscience,  on  behalf  of 
some  other  life  besides  your  own,  accidentally 
thrown  upon  your  protection.  To  fail,  to  collapse 
in  a  service  merely  your  own,  might  seem  compara- 
tively venial ;  though,  in  fact,  it  is  far  from  venial. 
But  to  fail  in  a  case  where  Providence  has  suddenly 
thrown  into  your  hands  the  final  interests  of  another, 
—  a  fellow-creature  shuddering  between  the  gates 
of  life  and  death:  this,  to  a  man  of  apprehensive 
conscience,  would  mingle  the  misery  of  an  atrocious 
criminality  with  the  misery  of  a  bloody  calamity. 
You  are  called  upon,  by  the  case  supposed,  possibly 
to  die,  but  to  die  at  the  very  moment  when,  by  any 
even  partial  failure  or  effeminate  collapse  of  your 
energies,  you  will  be  self-denounced  as  a  murderer. 
You  had  but  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  for  your  effort, 
and  that  effort  might  have  been  unavailing;  but  to 
have  risen  to  the  level  of  such  an  effort  would  have 
rescued  you,  though  not  from  dying,  yet  from  dying 
as  a  traitor  to  your  final  and  farewell  duty. 

The  situation  here  contemplated  exposes  a  dread- 
ful ulcer,  lurking  far  down  in  the  depths  of  human 
nature.  It  is  not  that  men  generally  are  summoned 
to  face  such  awful  trials.  But  potentially,  and  in 
shadowy  outline,  such  a  trial  is  moving  subterrane- 
ously  in  perhaps  all  men's  natures.  Upon  the  secret 
mirror  of  our  dreams  such  a  trial  is  darkly  projected, 
perhaps,  to  every  one  of  us.  That  dream,  so  fa- 
miliar to  childhood,  of  meeting  a  lion,  and,  through 


136  Best  English  Essays 

languishing  prostration  in  hope  and  the  energies  of 
hope,  that  constant  sequel  of  lying  down  before  the 
lion,  publishes  the  secret  frailty  of  human  nature  — 
reveals  its  deep-seated  falsehood  to  itself  —  records 
its  abysmal  treachery.  Perhaps  not  one  of  us  es- 
capes that  dream;  perhaps,  as  by  some  sorrowful 
doom  of  man,  that  dream  repeats  for  every  one  of 
us,  through  every  generation,  the  original  tempta- 
tion in  Eden.  Every  one  of  us,  in  this  dream,  has  a 
bait  offered  to  the  infirm  places  of  his  own  individ- 
ual will ;  once  again  a  snare  is  presented  for  tempt- 
ing him  into  captivity  to  a  luxury  of  ruin ;  once 
again,  as  in  aboriginal  Paradise,  the  man  falls  by 
his  own  choice;  again,  by  infinite  iteration,  the 
ancient  earth  groans  to  Heaven,  through  her  secret 
caves,  over  the  weakness  of  her  child.  "  Nature, 
from  her  seat,  sighing  through  all  her  works,"  again 
"  gives  signs  of  woe  that  all  is  lost " ;  and  again  the 
counter-sigh  is  repeated  to  the  sorrowing  heavens 
for  the  endless  rebellion  against  God.  It  is  not 
without  probability  that  in  the  world  of  dreams 
every  one  of  us  ratifies  for  himself  the  original 
transgression.  In  dreams,  perhaps  under  some 
secret  conflict  of  the  midnight  sleeper,  lighted  up  to 
the  consciousness  at  the  time,  but  darkened  to  the 
memory  as  soon  as  all  is  finished,  each  several  child 
of  our  mysterious  race  completes  for  himself  the 
treason  of  the  aboriginal  fall. 

The  incident,  so  memorable  in  itself  by  its  features 
of  horror,  and  so  scenical  by  its  grouping  for  the 
eye,  which  furnished  the  text  for  this  reverie  upon 
Sudden  Death,  occurred  to  myself  in  the  dead  of 
night,  as  a  solitary  spectator,  when  seated  on  the 


De  Quincey  137 

box  of  the  Manchester  and  Glasgow  mail,  in  the 
second  or  third  summer  after  Waterloo.  I  find  it 
necessary  to  relate  the  circumstances,  because  they 
are  such  as  could  not  have  occurred  unless  under  a 
singular  combination  of  accidents.  In  those  days, 
the  oblique  and  lateral  communications  with  many 
rural  post-offices  were  so  arranged,  either  through 
necessity  or  through  defect  of  system,  as  to  make 
it  requisite  for  the  main  north-western  mail  (i.  e. 
the  down  mail)  on  reaching  Manchester  to  halt  for 
a  number  of  hours  ;  how  many,  I  do  not  remember ; 
six  or  seven,  I  think ;  but  the  result  was  that,  in  the 
ordinary  course,  the  mail  recommenced  its  journey 
northwards  about  midnight.  Wearied  with  the  long 
detention  at  a  gloomy  hotel,  I  walked  out  about 
eleven  o'clock  at  night  for  the  sake  of  fresh  air; 
meaning  to  fall  in  with  the  mail  and  resume  my  seat 
at  the  post-office.  The  night,  however,  being  yet 
dark,  as  the  moon  had  scarcely  risen,  and  the  streets 
being  at  that  hour  empty,  so  as  to  offer  no  oppor- 
tunities for  asking  the  road,  I  lost  my  way,  and  did 
not  reach  the  post-office  until  it  was  considerably 
past  midnight;  but,  to  my  great  relief  (as  it  was 
important  for  me  to  be  in  Westmorland  by  the  morn- 
ing), I  saw  in  the  huge  saucer  eyes  of  the  mail, 
blazing  through  the  gloom,  an  evidence  that  my 
chance  was  not  yet  lost.  Past  the  time  it  was ;  but, 
by  some  rare  accident,  the  mail  was  not  even  yet 
ready  to  start.  I  ascended  to  my  seat  on  the  box, 
where  my  cloak  was  still  lying  as  it  had  lain  at  the 
Bridgewater  Arms.  I  had  left  it  there  in  imitation 
of  a  nautical  discoverer,  who  leaves  a  bit  of  bunting 
on  the  shore  of  his  discovery,  by  way  of  warning  off 
the  ground  the  whole  human  race,  and  notifying  to 


138  Best  English  Essays 

the  Christian  and  the  heathen  worlds,  with  his  best 
compliments,  that  he  has  hoisted  his  pocket-hand- 
kerchief once  and  for  ever  upon  that  virgin  soil : 
thenceforward  claiming  the  jus  dominii  to  the  top 
of  the  atmosphere  above  it,  and  also  the  right  of 
driving  shafts  to  the  centre  of  the  earth  below  it; 
so  that  all  people  found  after  this  warning  either 
aloft  in  upper  chambers  of  the  atmosphere,  or  grop- 
ing in  subterraneous  shafts,  or  squatting  auda- 
ciously on  the  surface  of  the  soil,  will  be  treated  as 
trespassers  —  kicked,  that  is  to  say,  or  decapitated, 
as  circumstances  may  suggest,  by  their  very  faithful 
servant,  the  owner  of  the  said  pocket-handkerchief. 
In  the  present  case,  it  is  probable  that  my  cloak 
might  not  have  been  respected,  and  the  jus  gentium 
might  have  been  cruelly  violated  in  my  person  — 
for,  in  the  dark,  people  commit  deeds  of  darkness, 
gas  being  a  great  ally  of  morality;  but  it  so  hap- 
pened that  on  this  night  there  was  no  other  outside 
passenger;  and  thus  the  crime,  which  else  was  but 
too  probable,  missed  fire  for  want  of  a  criminal. 

Having  mounted  the  box,  I  took  a  small  quantity 
of  laudanum,  having  already  travelled  two  hundred 
and  fifty  miles  —  viz.  from  a  point  seventy  miles 
beyond  London.  In  the  taking  of  laudanum  there 
was  nothing  extraordinary.  But  by  accident  it  drew 
upon  me  the  special  attention  of  my  assessor  on  the 
box,  the  coachman.  And  in  that  also  there  was 
nothing  extraordinary.  But  by  accident,  and  with 
great  delight,  it  drew  my  own  attention  to  the  fact 
that  this  coachman  was  a  monster  in  point  of  bulk, 
and  that  he  had  but  one  eye.  In  fact,  he  had  been 
foretold  by  Virgil  as 
"  Monstrum  horrendum,  informe,  ingens,  cui  lumen  ademptum." 


De  Quincey  139 

He  answered  to  the  conditions  in  every  one  of  the 
items: —  i,  a  monster  he  was;  2,  dreadful;  3, 
shapeless;  4,  huge;  5,  who  had  lost  an  eye.  But 
why  should  that  delight  me?  Had  he  been  one  of 
the  Calendars  in  the  "  Arabian  Nights,"  and  had 
paid  down  his  eye  as  the  price  of  his  criminal  curi- 
osity, what  right  had  /  to  exult  in  his  misfortune  ?  I 
did  not  exult ;  I  delighted  in  no  man's  punishment, 
though  it  were  even  merited.  But  these  personal 
distinctions  (Nos.  i,  2,  3,  4,  5)  identified  in  an  in- 
stant an  old  friend  of  mine  whom  I  had  known  in 
the  south  for  some  years  as  the  most  masterly  of 
mail-coachmen.  He  was  the  man  in  all  Europe 
that  could  (if  any  could)  have  driven  six-in-hand 
full  gallop  over  A I  Sir  at  —  that  dreadful  bridge  of 
Mahomet,  with  no  side  battlements,  and  of  extra 
room  not  enough  for  a  razor's  edge  —  leading  right 
across  the  bottomless  gulf.  Under  this  eminent  man, 
whom  in  Greek  I  cognominated  Cyclops  Diphrelates 
(Cyclops  the  Charioteer),  I,  and  others  known  to 
me,  studied  the  diphrelatic  art.  Excuse,  reader, 
a  word  too  elegant  to  be  pedantic.  As  a  pupil, 
though  I  paid  extra  fees,  it  is  to  be  lamented  that 
I  did  not  stand  high  in  his  esteem.  It  showed  his 
dogged  honesty  (though,  observe,  not  his  discern- 
ment) that  he  could  not  see  my  merits.  Let  us 
excuse  his  absurdity  in  this  particular  by  remem- 
bering his  want  of  an  eye.  Doubtless  that  made  him 
blind  to  my  merits.  In  the  art  of  conversation, 
however,  he  admitted  that  I  had  the  whip-hand  of 
him.  On  this  present  occasion  great  joy  was  at  our 
meeting.  But  what  was  Cyclops  doing  here?  Had 
the  medical  men  recommended  northern  air,  or  how  ? 
I  collected,  from  such  explanations  as  he  volun- 


140  Best  English  Essays 

teered,  that  he  had  an  interest  at  stake  in  some  suit- 
at-law  now  pending  at  Lancaster ;  so  that  probably 
he  had  got  himself  transferred  to  this  station  for  the 
purpose  of  connecting  with  his  professional  pursuits 
an  instant  readiness  for  the  calls  of  his  lawsuit. 

Meantime,  what  are  we  stopping  for?  Surely  we 
have  now  waited  long  enough.  Oh,  this  procras- 
tinating mail,  and  this  procrastinating  post-office! 
Can't  they  take  a  lesson  upon  that  subject  from  me? 
Some  people  have  called  me  procrastinating.  Yet 
you  are  witness,  reader,  that  I  was  here  kept  waiting 
for  the  post-office.  Will  the  post-office  lay  its  hand 
on  its  heart,  in  its  moments  of  sobriety,  and  assert 
that  ever  it  waited  for  me?  What  are  they  about? 
The  guard  tells  me  that  there  is  a  large  extra 
accumulation  of  foreign  mails  this  night,  owing  to 
irregularities  caused  by  war,  by  wind,  by  weather,  in 
the  packet  service,  which  as  yet  does  not  benefit  at 
all  by  steam.  For  an  extra  hour,  it  seems,  the  post- 
office  has  been  engaged  in  threshing  out  the  pure 
wheaten  correspondence  of  Glasgow,  and  winnow- 
ing it  from  the  chaff  of  all  baser  intermediate 
towns.  But  at  last  all  is  finished.  Sound  your 
horn,  guard !  Manchester,  good-bye !  we  Ve  lost 
an  hour  by  your  criminal  conduct  at  the  post-office : 
which,  however,  though  I  do  not  mean  to  part  with 
a  serviceable  ground  of  complaint,  and  one  which 
really  is  such  for  the  horses,  to  me  secretly  is  an 
advantage,  since  it  compels  us  to  look  sharply  for 
this  lost  hour  amongst  the  next  eight  or  nine,  and 
to  recover  it  (if  we  can)  at  the  rate  of  one  mile 
extra  per  hour.  Off  we  are  at  last,  and  at  eleven 
miles  an  hour;  and  for  the  moment  I  detect  no 
changes  in  the  energy  or  in  the  skill  of  Cyclops. 


De  Quincey  141 

From  Manchester  to  Kendal,  which  virtually 
(though  not  in  law)  is  the  capital  of  Westmor- 
land, there  were  at  this  time  seven  stages  of  eleven 
miles  each.  The  first  five  of  these,  counting  from 
Manchester,  terminate  in  Lancaster ;  which  is  there- 
fore fifty-five  miles  north  of  Manchester,  and  the 
same  distance  exactly  from  Liverpool.  The  first 
three  stages  terminate  in  Preston  (called,  by  way 
of  distinction  from  other  towns  of  that  name,  Proud 
Preston)  ;  at  which  place  it  is  that  the  separate 
roads  from  Liverpool  and  from  Manchester  to  the 
north  become  confluent.1  Within  these  first  three 
stages  lay  the  foundation,  the  progress,  and  termi- 
nation of  our  night's  adventure.  During  the  first 
stage,  I  found  out  that  Cyclops  was  mortal :  he 
was  liable  to  the  shocking  affection  of  sleep  —  a 
thing  which  previously  I  had  never  suspected.  If 
a  man  indulges  in  the  vicious  habit  of  sleeping,  all 
the  skill  in  aurigation  of  Apollo  himself,  with  the 
horses  of  Aurora  to  execute  his  notions,  avails  him 
nothing.  "  Oh,  Cyclops !  "  I  exclaimed,  "  thou  art 
mortal.  My  friend,  thou  snorest."  Through  the 
first  eleven  miles,  however,  this  infirmity  —  which 
I  grieve  to  say  that  he  shared  with  the  whole  Pagan 
Pantheon  —  betrayed  itself  only  by  brief  snatches. 
On  waking  up,  he  made  an  apology  for  himself 
which,  instead  of  mending  matters,  laid  open  a 

1  "Confluent":  —  Suppose  a  capital  Y  (the  Pythagorean 
letter):  Lancaster  is  at  the  foot  of  this  letter;  Liverpool  at 
the  top  of  the  right  branch;  Manchester  at  the  top  of  the  left ; 
Proud  Preston  at  the  centre,  where  the  two  branches  unite.  It 
is  thirty-three  miles  along  either  of  the  two  branches;  it  is 
twenty-two  miles  along  the  stem  —  viz.  from  Preston  in  the 
middle  to  Lancaster  at  the  root.  There  's  a  lesson  in  geography 
for  the  reader  !  (De  Quincey's  note.) 


142  Best  English  Essays 

gloomy  vista  of  coming  disasters.  The  summer 
assizes,  he  reminded  me,  were  now  going  on  at 
Lancaster :  in  consequence  of  which  for  three  nights 
and  three  days  he  had  not  lain  down  in  a  bed. 
During  the  day  he  was  waiting  for  his  own  sum- 
mons as  a  witness  on  the  trial  in  which  he  was 
interested,  or  else,  lest  he  should  be  missing  at  the 
critical  moment,  was  drinking  with  the  other  wit- 
nesses under  the  pastoral  surveillance  of  the  attor- 
neys. During  the  night,  or  that  part  of  it  which  at 
sea  would  form  the  middle  watch,  he  was  driving. 
This  explanation  certainly  accounted  for  his  drow- 
siness, but  in  a  way  which  made  it  much  more 
alarming;  since  now,  after  several  days'  resistance 
to  this  infirmity,  at  length  he  was  steadily  giving 
way.  Throughout  the  second  stage  he  grew  more 
and  more  drowsy.  In  the  second  mile  of  the  third 
stage  he  surrendered  himself  finally  and  without 
a  struggle  to  his  perilous  temptation.  All  his  past 
resistance  had  but  deepened  the  weight  of  this  final 
oppression.  Seven  atmospheres  of  sleep  rested 
upon  him ;  and,  to  consummate  the  case,  our  worthy 
guard,  after  singing  "  Love  amongst  the  Roses  "  for 
perhaps  thirty  times,  without  invitation  and  without 
applause,  had  in  revenge  moodily  resigned  himself 
to  slumber  —  not  so  deep,  doubtless,  as  the  coach- 
man's, but  deep  enough  for  mischief.  And  thus 
at  last,  about  ten  miles  from  Preston,  it  came  about 
that  I  found  myself  left  in  charge  of  his  Majesty's 
London  and  Glasgow  mail,  then  running  at  the 
least  twelve  miles  an  hour. 

What  made  this  negligence  less  criminal  than 
else  it  must  have  been  thought  was  the  condition 
of  the  roads  at  nigjit  during:  the  assizes.  At  that 


De  Quincey  143 

time,  all  the  law  business  of  populous  Liverpool, 
and  also  of  populous  Manchester,  with  its  vast 
cincture  of  populous  rural  districts,  was  called  up 
by  ancient  usage  to  the  tribunal  of  Lilliputian  Lan- 
caster. To  break  up  this  old  traditional  usage 
required,  i,  a  conflict  with  powerful  established 
interests,  2,  a  large  system  of  new  arrangements, 
and  3,  a  new  parliamentary  statute.  But  as  yet 
this  change  was  merely  in  contemplation.  As  things 
were  at  present,  twice  in  the  year  so  vast  a  body 
of  business  rolled  northwards  from  the  southern 
quarter  of  the  county  that  for  a  fortnight  at  least 
it  occupied  the  severe  exertions  of  two  judges  in 
its  despatch.  The  consequence  of  this  was  that 
every  horse  available  for  such  a  service,  along  the 
whole  line  of  road,  was  exhausted  in  carrying  down 
the  multitudes  of  people  who  were  parties  to  the 
different  suits.  By  sunset,  therefore,  it  usually 
happened  that,  through  utter  exhaustion  amongst 
men  and  horses,  the  road  sank  into  profound  silence. 
Except  the  exhaustion  in  the  vast  adjacent  county 
of  York  from  a  contested  election,  no  such  silence 
succeeding  to  no  such  fiery  uproar  was  ever  wit- 
nessed in  England. 

On  this  occasion  the  usual  silence  and  solitude 
prevailed  along  the  road.  Not  a  hoof  nor  a  wheel 
was  to  be  heard.  And,  to  strengthen  this  false 
luxurious  confidence  in  the  noiseless  roads,  it  hap- 
pened also  that  the  night  was  one  of  peculiar  solem- 
nity and  peace.  For  my  own  part,  though  slightly 
alive  to  the  possibilities  of  peril,  I  had  so  far  yielded 
to  the  influence  of  the  mighty  calm  as  to  sink  into 
a  profound  reverie.  The  month  was  August ;  in  the 
middle  of  which  lay  my  own  birthday  —  a  festival 


144  Best  English  Essays 

to  every  thoughtful  man  suggesting  solemn  and 
often  sigh-born  thoughts.  The  county  was  my  own 
native  county  —  upon  which,  in  its  southern  section, 
more  than  upon  any  equal  area  known  to  man  past 
or  present,  had  descended  the  original  curse  of 
labor  in  its  heaviest  form,  not  mastering  the  bodies 
only  of  men,  as  of  slaves,  or  criminals  in  mines, 
but  working  through  the  fiery  will.  Upon  no  equal 
space  of  earth  was,  or  ever  had  been,  the  same 
energy  of  human  power  put  forth  daily.  At  this 
particular  season  also  of  the  assizes,  that  dread- 
ful hurricane  of  flight  and  pursuit,  as  it  might 
have  seemed  to  a  stranger,  which  swept  to  and 
from  Lancaster  all  day  long,  hunting  the  county 
up  and  down,  and  regularly  subsiding  back  into 
silence  about  sunset,  could  not  fail  (when  united 
with  this  permanent  distinction  of  Lancashire  as 
the  very  metropolis  and  citadel  of  labor)  to  point 
the  thoughts  pathetically  upon  that  counter-vision 
of  rest,  of  saintly  repose  from  strife  and  sorrow, 
towards  which,  as  to  their  secret  haven,  the  pro- 
founder  aspirations  of  man's  heart  are  in  solitude 
continually  travelling.  Obliquely  upon  our  left  we 
were  nearing  the  sea;  which  also  must,  under  the 
present  circumstances,  be  repeating  the  general  state 
of  halcyon  repose.  The  sea,  the  atmosphere,  the 
light,  bore  each  an  orchestral  part  in  this  universal 
lull.  Moonlight  and  the  first  timid  tremblings  of  the 
dawn  were  by  this  time  blending ;  and  the  blend- 
ings  were  brought  into  a  still  more  exquisite  state 
of  unity  by  a  slight  silvery  mist,  motionless  and 
dreamy,  that  covered  the  woods  and  fields,  but  with 
a  veil  of  equable  transparency.  Except  the  feet 
of  our  own  horses,  —  which,  running  on  a  sandy 


De  Quincey  145 

margin  of  the  road,  made  but  little  disturbance,  — 
there  was  no  sound  abroad.  In  the  clouds  and  on 
the  earth  prevailed  the  same  majestic  peace;  and, 
in  spite  of  all  that  the  villain  of  a  schoolmaster  has 
done  for  the  ruin  of  our  sublimer  thoughts,  which 
are  the  thoughts  of  our  infancy,  we  still  believe  in 
no  such  nonsense  as  a  limited  atmosphere.  What- 
ever we  may  swear  with  our  false  feigning  lips, 
in  our  faithful  hearts  we  still  believe,  and  must 
for  ever  believe,  in  fields  of  air  traversing  the  total 
gulf  between  earth  and  the  central  heavens.  Still, 
in  the  confidence  of  children  that  tread  without  fear 
every  chamber  in  their  father's  house,  and  to  whom 
no  door  is  closed,  we,  in  that  Sabbatic  vision  which 
sometimes  is  revealed  for  an  hour  upon  nights 
like  this,  ascend  with  easy  steps  from  the  sorrow- 
stricken  fields  of  earth  upwards  to  the  sandals  of 
God. 

Suddenly,  from  thoughts  like  these  I  was  awak- 
ened to  a  sullen  sound,  as  of  some  motion  on 
the  distant  road.  It  stole  upon  the  air  for  a  mo- 
ment; I  listened  in  awe;  but  then  it  died  away. 
Once  roused,  however,  I  could  not  but  observe 
with  alarm  the  quickened  motion  of  our  horses. 
Ten  years'  experience  had  made  my  eye  learned 
in  the  valuing  of  motion ;  and  I  saw  that  we  were 
now  running  thirteen  miles  an  hour.  I  pretend  to 
no  presence  of  mind.  On  the  contrary,  my  fear  is 
that  I  am  miserably  and  shamefully  deficient  in  that 
quality  as  regards  action.  The  palsy  of  doubt  and 
distraction  hangs  like  some  guilty  weight  of  dark 
unfathomed  remembrances  upon  my  energies  when 
the  signal  is  flying  for  action.  But,  on  the  other 
hand,  this  accursed  gift  I  have,  as  regards  thought, 

10 


146  Best  English  Essays 

that  in  the  first  step  towards  the  possibility  of  a 
misfortune  I  see  its  total  evolution;  in  the  radix 
of  the  series  I  see  too  certainly  and  too  instantly 
its  entire  expansion ;  in  the  first  syllable  of  the 
dreadful  sentence  I  read  already  the  last.  It  was 
not  that  I  feared  for  ourselves.  Us  our  bulk  and 
impetus  charmed  against  peril  in  any  collision.  And 
I  had  ridden  through  too  many  hundreds  of  perils 
that  were  frightful  to  approach,  that  were  matter 
of  laughter  to  look  back  upon,  the  first  face  of 
which  was  horror,  the  parting  face  a  jest  —  for  any 
anxiety  to  rest  upon  our  interests.  The  mail  was 
not  built,  I  felt  assured,  nor  bespoke,  that  could 
betray  me  who  trusted  to  its  protection.  But  any 
carriage  that  we  could  meet  would  be  frail  and  light 
in  comparison  of  ourselves.  And  I  remarked  this 
ominous  accident  of  our  situation,  —  we  were  on 
the  wrong  side  of  the  road.  But  then,  it  may  be 
said,  the  other  party,  if  other  there  was,  might  also 
be  on  the  wrong  side ;  and  two  wrongs  might  make 
a  right.  That  was  not  likely.  The  same  motive 
which  had  drawn  us  to  the  right-hand  side  of  the 
road  —  viz.  the  luxury  of  the  soft  beaten  sand  as 
contrasted  with  the  paved  centre  —  would  prove 
attractive  to  others.  The  two  adverse  carriages 
would  therefore,  to  a  certainty,  be  travelling  on  the 
same  side ;  and  from  this  side,  as  not  being  ours 
in  law,  the  crossing  over  to  the  other  would,  of 
course,  be  looked  for  from  us.  Our  lamps,  still 
lighted,  would  give  the  impression  of  vigilance  on 
our  part.  And  every  creature  that  met  us  would 
rely  upon  us  for  quartering.  All  this,  and  if  the 
separate  links  of  the  anticipation  had  been  a  thou- 
sand times  more,  I  saw,  not  discursively,  or  by 


De  Quincey  147 

effort,  or  by  succession,  but  by  one  flash  of  horrid 
simultaneous  intuition. 

Under  this  steady  though  rapid  anticipation  of 
the  evil  which  might  be  gathering  ahead,  ah!  what 
a  sullen  mystery  of  fear,  what  a  sigh  of  woe,  was 
that  which  stole  upon  the  air,  as  again  the  far-off 
sound  of  a  wheel  was  heard !  A  whisper  it  was  — 
a  whisper  from,  perhaps,  four  miles  off  —  secretly 
announcing  a  ruin  that,  being  foreseen,  was  not  the 
less  inevitable ;  that,  being  known,  was  not  there- 
fore healed.  What  could  be  done  —  who  was  it  that 
could  do  it  —  to  check  the  storm-flight  of  these 
maniacal  horses?  Could  I  not  seize  the  reins  from 
the  grasp  of  the  slumbering  coachman?  You, 
reader,  think  that  it  would  have  been  in  your  power 
to  do  so.  And  I  quarrel  not  with  your  estimate  of 
yourself.  But,  from  the  way  in  which  the  coach- 
man's hand  was  viced  between  his  upper  and  lower 
thigh,  this  was  impossible.  Easy  was  it  ?  See,  then, 
that  bronze  equestrian  statue.  The  cruel  rider  has 
kept  the  bit  in  his  horse's  mouth  for  two  centuries. 
Unbridle  him  for  a  minute,  if  you  please,  and  wash 
his  mouth  with  water.  Easy  was  it?  Unhorse  me, 
then,  that  imperial  rider;  knock  me  those  marble 
feet  from  those  marble  stirrups  of  Charlemagne. 

The  sounds  ahead  strengthened,  and  were  now 
too  clearly  the  sounds  of  wheels.  Who  and  what 
could  it  be  ?  Was  it  industry  in  a  taxed  cart  ?  Was 
it  youthful  gaiety  in  a  gig?  Was  it  sorrow  that 
loitered,  or  joy  that  raced?  For  as  yet  the  snatches 
of  sound  were  too  intermitting,  from  distance,  to 
decipher  the  character  of  the  motion.  Whoever 
were  the  travellers,  something  must  be  done  to  warn 
them.  Upon  the  other  party  rests  the  active  respon- 


148  Best  English  Essays 

sibility,  but  upon  MS  —  and,  woe  is  me !  that  us  was 
reduced  to  my  frail  opium-shattered  self  —  rests  the 
responsibility  of  warning.  Yet,  how  should  this  be 
accomplished?  Might  I  not  sound  the  guard's 
horn  ?  Already,  on  the  first  thought,  I  was'making 
my  way  over  the  roof  to  the  guard's  seat.  But  this, 
from  the  accident  which  I  have  mentioned,  of  the 
foreign  mails  being  piled  upon  the  roof,  was  a  diffi- 
cult and  even  dangerous  attempt  to  one  cramped  by 
nearly  three  hundred  miles  of  outside  travelling. 
And,  fortunately,  before  I  had  lost  much  time  in  the 
attempt,  our  frantic  horses  swept  round  an  angle  of 
the  road  which  opened  upon  us  that  final  stage 
where  the  collision  must  be  accomplished  and  the 
catastrophe  sealed.  All  was  apparently  finished. 
The  court  was  sitting;  the  case  was  heard;  the 
judge  had  finished;  and  only  the  verdict  was  yet 
in  arrear. 

Before  us  lay  an  avenue  straight  as  an  arrow,  six 
hundred  yards,  perhaps,  in  length;  and  the  um- 
brageous trees,  which  rose  in  a  regular  line  from 
either  side,  meeting  high  overhead,  gave  to  it  the 
character  of  a  cathedral  aisle.  These  trees  lent  a 
deeper  solemnity  to  the  early  light;  but  there  was 
still  light  enough  to  perceive,  at  the  further  end  of 
this  Gothic  aisle,  a  frail  reedy  gig,  in  which  were 
seated  a  young  man,  and  by  his  side  a  young  lady. 
Ah,  young  sir!  what  are  you  about?  If  it  is  requi- 
site that  you  should  whisper  your  communications 
to  this  young  lady  —  though  really  I  see  nobody,  at 
an  hour  and  on  a  road  so  solitary,  likely  to  overhear 
you — it  is  therefore  requisite  that  you  should  carry 
your  lips  forward  to  hers?  The  little  carriage  is 
creeping  on  at  one  mile  an  hour;  and  the  parties 


De  Quincey  149 

within  it,  being  thus  tenderly  engaged,  are  naturally 
bending  down  their  heads.  Between  them  and  eter- 
nity, to  all  human  calculation,  there  is  but  a  minute 
and  a  half.  Oh,  heavens  !  what  is  it  that  I  shall  do  ? 
Speaking  or  acting,  what  help  can  I  offer  ?  Strange 
it  is,  and  to  a  mere  auditor  of  the  tale  might  seem 
laughable,  that  I  should  need  a  suggestion  from  the 
"  Iliad  "  to  prompt  the  sole  resource  that  remained. 
Yet  so  it  was.  Suddenly  I  remembered  the  shout 
of  Achilles,  and  its  effect.  But  could  I  pretend  to 
shout  like  the  son  of  Peleus,  aided  by  Pallas  ?  No : 
but  then  I  needed  not  the  shout  that  should  alarm 
all  Asia  militant;  such  a  shout  would  suffice  as 
might  carry  terror  into  the  hearts  of  two  thought- 
less young  people  and  one  gig-horse.  I  shouted  — 
and  the  young  man  heard  me  not.  A  second  time 
I  shouted  —  and  now  he  heard  me,  for  now  he  raised 
his  head. 

Here,  then,  all  had  been  done  that,  by  me,  could 
be  done ;  more  on  my  part  was  not  possible.  Mine 
had  been  the  first  step;  the  second  was  for  the 
young  man ;  the  third  was  for  God.  If,  said  I,  this 
stranger  is  a  brave  man,  and  if  indeed  he  loves  the 
young  girl  at  his  side  —  or,  loving  her  not,  if  he 
feels  the  obligation,  pressing  upon  every  man 
worthy  to  be  called  a  man,  of  doing  his  utmost  for 
a  woman  confided  to  his  protection  —  he  will  at  least 
make  some  effort  to  save  her.  If  that  fails,  he  will 
not  perish  the  more,  or  by  a  death  more  cruel,  for 
having  made  it;  and  he  will  die  as  a  brave  man 
should,  with  his  face  to  the  danger,  and  with  his 
arm  about  the  woman  that  he  sought  in  vain  to  save. 
But,  if  he  makes  no  effort.  —  shrinking  without  a 
struggle  from  his  duty,  —  he  himself  will  not  the 


150  Best  English  Essays 

less  certainly  perish  for  this  baseness  of  poltroonery. 
He  will  die  no  less :  and  why  not  ?  Wherefore 
should  we  grieve  that  there  is  one  craven  less  in  the 
world?  No;  let  him  perish,  without  a  pitying 
thought  of  ours  wasted  upon  him ;  and,  in  that  case, 
all  our  grief  will  be  reserved  for  the  fate  of  the 
helpless  girl  who  now,  upon  the  least  shadow  of 
failure  in  him,  must  by  the  fiercest  of  translations 
—  must  without  time  for  a  prayer  —  must  within 
seventy  seconds  —  stand  before  the  judgment-seat 
of  God. 

But  craven  he  was  not :  sudden  had  been  the  call 
upon  him,  and  sudden  was  his  answer  to  the  call. 
He  saw,  he  heard,  he  comprehended,  the  ruin  that 
was  coming  down:  already  its  gloomy  shadow 
darkened  above  him ;  and  already  he  was  measuring 
his  strength  to  deal  with  it.  Ah !  what  a  vulgar 
thing  does  courage  seem  when  we  see  nations  buy- 
ing it  and  selling  it  for  a  shilling  a-day :  ah  !  what 
a  sublime  thing  does  courage  seem  when  some  fear- 
ful summons  on  the  great  deeps  of  life  carries  a 
man,  as  if  running  before  a  hurricane,  up  to  the 
giddy  crest  of  some  tumultuous  crisis  from  which 
lie  two  courses,  and  a  voice  says  to  him  audibly, 
"  One  way  lies  hope ;  take  the  other,  and  mourn 
for  ever !  "  How  grand  a  triumph  if,  even  then, 
amidst  the  raving  of  all  around  him,  and  the  frenzy 
of  the  danger,  the  man  is  able  to  confront  his  situ- 
ation —  is  able  to  retire  for  a  moment  into  solitude 
with  God,  and  to  seek  his  counsel  from  Him! 

For  seven  seconds,  it  might  be,  of  his  seventy,  the 
stranger  settled  his  countenance  steadfastly  upon  us, 
as  if  to  search  and  value  every  element  in  the  con- 
flict before  him.  For  five  seconds  more  of  his 


De  Quincey  151 

seventy  he  sat  immovably,  like  one  that  mused  on 
some  great  purpose.  For  five  more,  perhaps,  he  sat 
with  eyes  upraised,  like  one  that  prayed  in  sorrow, 
under  some  extremity  of  doubt,  for  light  that  should 
guide  him  to  the  better  choice.  Then  suddenly  he 
rose ;  stood  upright ;  and,  by  a  powerful  strain  upon 
the  reins,  raising  his  horse's  fore-feet  from  the 
ground,  he  slewed  him  round  on  the  pivot  of  his 
hind-legs,  so  as  to  plant  the  little  equipage  in  a 
position  nearly  at  right  angles  to  ours.  Thus  far 
his  condition  was  not  improved;  except  as  a  first 
step  had  been  taken  towards  the  possibility  of  a 
second.  If  no  more  were  done,  nothing  was  done ; 
-for  the  little  carriage  still  occupied  the  very  centre 
of  our  path,  though  in  an  altered  direction.  Yet 
even  now  it  may  not  be  too  late :  fifteen  of  the 
seventy  seconds  may  still  be  unexhausted;  and  one 
almighty  bound  may  avail  to  clear  the  ground. 
Hurry,  then,  hurry !  for  the  flying  moments  —  they 
hurry.  Oh,  hurry,  hurry,  my  brave  young  man! 
for  the  cruel  hoofs  of  our  horses  —  they  also  hurry ! 
Fast  are  the  flying  moments,  faster  are  the  hoofs  of 
our  horses.  But  fear  not  for  him,  if  human  energy 
can  suffice ;  faithful  was  he  that  drove  to  his  terrific 
duty  ;  faithful  was  the  horse  to  his  command.  One 
blow,  one  impulse  given  with  voice  and  hand,  by  the 
stranger,  one  rush  from  the  horse,  one  bound  as  if 
in  the  act  of  rising  to  a  fence,  landed  the  docile  crea- 
ture's fore-feet  upon  the  crown  or  arching  centre  of 
the  road.  The  larger  half  of  the  little  equipage  had 
then  cleared  our  over-towering  shadow:  that  was 
evident  even  to  my  own  agitated  sight.  But  it 
mattered  little  that  one  wreck  should  float  off  in 
safety  if  upon  the  wreck  that  perished  were  em- 


152  Best  English  Essays 

barked  the  human  freightage.  The  rear  part  of  the 
carriage  —  was  that  certainly  beyond  the  line  of 
absolute  ruin?  What  power  could  answer  the  ques- 
tion ?  Glance  of  eye,  thought  of  man,  wing  of  angel, 
which  of  these  had  speed  enough  to  sweep  between 
the  question  and  the  answer,  and  divide  the  one 
from  the  other?  Light  does  not  tread  upon  the 
steps  of  light  more  indivisibly  than  did  our  all- 
conquering  arrival  upon  the  escaping  efforts  of  the 
gig.  That  must  the  young  man  have  felt  too  plainly. 
His  back  was  now  turned  to  us ;  not  by  sight  could 
he  any  longer  communicate  with  the  peril ;  but,  by 
the  dreadful  rattle  of  our  harness,  too  truly  had  his 
ear  been  instructed  that  all  was  finished  as  regarded 
any  effort  of  his.  Already  in  resignation  he  had 
rested  from  his  struggle;  and  perhaps  in  his  heart 
he  was  whispering,  "  Father,  which  art  in  heaven, 
do  Thou  finish  above  what  I  on  earth  have  at- 
tempted." Faster  than  ever  mill-race  we  ran  past 
them  in  our  inexorable  flight.  Oh,  raving  of  hurri- 
canes that  must  have  sounded  in  their  young  ears 
at  the  moment  of  our  transit !  Even  in  that  moment 
the  thunder  of  collision  spoke  aloud.  Either  with 
the  swingle-bar,  or  with  the  haunch  of  our  near 
leader,  we  had  struck  the  off- wheel  of  the  little  gig ; 
which  stood  rather  obliquely,  and  not  quite  so  far 
advanced  as  to  be  accurately  parallel  with  the  near- 
wheel.  The  blow,  from  the  fury  of  our  passage, 
resounded  terrifically.  I  rose  in  horror,  to  gaze 
upon  the  ruins  we  might  have  caused.  From  my 
elevated  station  I  looked  down,  and  looked  back 
upon  the  scene ;  which  in  a  moment  told  its  own 
tale,  and  wrote  all  its  records  on  my  heart  for  ever. 
Here  was  the  map  of  the  passion  that  now  had 


De  Quincey  153 

finished.  The  horse  was  planted  immovably,  with 
his  fore-feet  upon  the  paved  crest  of  the  central 
road.  He  of  the  whole  party  might  be  supposed 
untouched  by  the  passion  of  death.  The  little  cany 
carriage  —  partly,  perhaps,  from  the  violent  torsion 
of  the  wheels  in  its  recent  movement,  partly  from 
the  thundering  blow  we  had  given  to  it  —  as  if  it 
sympathized  with  human  horror,  was  all  alive  with 
tremblings  and  shiverings.  The  young  man  trem- 
bled not,  nor  shivered.  He  sat  like  a  rock.  But  his 
was  the  steadiness  of  agitation  frozen  into  rest  by 
horror.  As  yet  he  dared  not  to  look  round;  for 
he  knew  that,  if  anything  remained  to  "do,  by  him 
it  could  no  longer  be  done.  And  as  yet  he  knew  not 
for  certain  if  their  safety  were  accomplished.  But 

the  lady 

But  the  lady !  Oh,  heavens !  will  that  spec- 
tacle ever  depart  from  my  dreams,  as  she  rose  and 
sank  upon  her  seat,  sank  and  rose,  threw  up  her 
arms  wildly  to  heaven,  clutched  at  some  visionary 
object  in  the  air,  fainting,  praying,  raving,  despair- 
ing? Figure  to  yourself,  reader,  the  elements  of 
the  case;  suffer  me  to  recall  before  your  mind  the 
circumstances  of  that  unparalleled  situation.  From 
the  silence  and  deep  peace  of  this  saintly  summer 
night  —  from  the  pathetic  blending  of  this  sweet 
moonlight,  dawnlight,  dreamlight  —  from  the  manly 
tenderness  of  this  flattering,  whispering,  murmuring 
love  —  suddenly  as  from  the  woods  and  fields  — 
suddenly  as  from  the  chambers  of  the  air  opening 
in  revelation  —  suddenly  as  from  the  ground  yawn- 
ing at  her  feet,  leaped  upon  her,  with  the  flashing 
of  cataracts,  Death  the  crowned  phantom,  with  all 
the  equipage  of  his  terrors,  and  the  tiger  roar  of  his 
voice. 


154  Best  English  Essays 

The  moments  were  numbered;  the  strife  was 
finished ;  the  vision  was  closed.  In  the  twinkling 
of  an  eye,  our  flying  horses  had  carried  us  to  the 
termination  of  the  umbrageous  aisle;  at  the  right 
angles  we  wheeled  into  our  former  direction ;  the 
turn  of  the  road  carried  the  scene  out  of  my  eyes 
in  an  instant,  and  swept  it  into  my  dreams  for  ever. 


SECTION  III  —  DREAM-FUGUE  : 

FOUNDED    ON     THE    PRECEDING    THEME    OF    SUDDEN 
DEATH 

"  Whence  the  sound 

Of  instruments,  that  made  melodious  chime, 
Was  heard,  of  harp  and  organ  ;  and  who  moved 
Their  stops  and  chords  was  seen ;  his  volant  touch 
Instinct  through  all  proportions,  low  and  high, 
Fled  and  pursued  transverse  the  resonant  fugue." 

Par.  Lost,  Bk.  XI. 

Tumultiiosissimamente 

PASSION  of  sudden  death !  that  once  in  youth  I 
read  and  interpreted  by  the  shadows  of  thy  averted 
signs ! *  —  rapture  of  panic  taking  the  shape  (which 
amongst  tombs  in  churches  I  have  seen)  of  woman 
bursting  her  sepulchral  bonds  —  of  woman's  Ionic 
form  bending  forward  from  the  ruins  of  her  grave 
with  arching  foot,  with  eyes  upraised,  with  clasped 
adoring  hands — waiting,  watching,  trembling,  pray- 

1  "  Averted  signs ":  —  I  read  the  course  and  changes  of  the 
lady's  agony  in  the  succession  of  her  involuntary  gestures  ;  but 
it  must  be  remembered  that  I  read  all  this  from  the  rear,  never 
once  catching  the  lady's  full  face,  and  even  her  profile  imper- 
fectly. (De  Quincey's  note.) 


De  Quincey  155 

ing  for  the  trumpet's  call  to  rise  from  dust  for  ever ! 
Ah,  vision  too  fearful  of  shuddering-  humanity  on 
the  brink  of  almighty  abysses !  —  vision  that  didst 
start  back,  that  didst  reel  away,  like  a  shrivelling 
scroll  from  before  the  wrath  of  fire  racing  on 
the  wings  of  the  wind !  Epilepsy  so  brief  of  horror, 
wherefore  is  it  that  thou  canst  not  die?  Passing 
so  suddenly  into  darkness,  wherefore  is  it  that 
still  thou  sheddest  thy  sad  funeral  blights  upon 
the  gorgeous  mosaics  of  dreams?  Fragment  of 
music  too  passionate,  heard  once,  and  heard  no 
more,  what  aileth  thee,  that  thy  deep  rolling  chords 
come  up  at  intervals  through  all  the  worlds  of  sleep, 
and  after  forty  years  have  lost  no  element  of  horror  ? 


Lo,  it  is  summer  —  almighty  summer!  The 
everlasting  gates  of  life  and  summer  are  thrown 
open  wide ;  and  on  the  ocean,  tranquil  and  verdant 
as  a  savannah,  the  unknown  lady  from  the  dreadful 
vision  and  I  myself  are  floating  —  she  upon  a  fairy 
pinnace,  and  I  upon  an  English  three-decker.  Both 
of  us  are  wooing  gales  of  festal  happiness  within 
the  domain  of  our  common  country,  within  that 
ancient  watery  park,  within  the  pathless  chase  of 
ocean,  where  England  takes  her  pleasure  as  a  hunt- 
ress through  winter  and  summer,  from  the  rising  to 
the  setting  sun.  Ah,  what  a  wilderness  of  floral 
beauty  was  hidden,  or  was  suddenly  revealed,  upon 
the  tropic  islands  through  which  the  pinnace  moved ! 
And  upon  her  deck  what  a  bevy  of  human  flowers : 
young  women  how  lovely,  young  men  how  noble, 


156  Best  English  Essays 

that  were  dancing-  together,  and  slowly  drifting 
towards  us  amidst  music  and  incense,  amidst  blos- 
soms from  forests  and  gorgeous  corymbi  from 
vintages,  amidst  natural  carolling,  and  the  echoes 
of  sweet  girlish  laughter.  Slowly  the  pinnace  nears 
us,  gaily  she  hails  us,  and  silently  she  disappears 
beneath  the  shadow  of  our  mighty  bows.  But  then, 
as  at  some  signal  from  heaven,  the  music,  and  the 
carols,  and  the  sweet  echoing  of  girlish  laughter  — 
all  are  hushed.  What  evil  has  smitten  the  pinnace, 
meeting  or  overtaking  her?  Did  ruin  to  our 
friends  couch  within  our  own  dreadful  shadow? 
Was  our  shadow  the  shadow  of  death?  I  looked 
over  the  bow  for  an  answer,  and,  behold !  the  pin- 
nace was  dismantled;  the  revel  and  the  revellers 
were  found  no  more;  the  glory  of  the  vintage  was 
dust ;  and  the  forests  with  their  beauty  were  left 
without  a  witness  upon  the  seas.  "  But  where," 
and  I  turned  to  our  crew  —  "  where  are  the  lovely 
women  that  danced  beneath  the  awning  of  flowers 
and  clustering  corymbi?  Whither  have  fled  the 
noble  young  men  that  danced  with  them?  "  An- 
swer there  was  none.  But  suddenly  the  man  at  the 
mast-head,  whose  countenance  darkened  with  alarm, 
cried  out,  "  Sail  on  the  weather  beam !  Down  she 
comes  upon  us :  in  seventy  seconds  she  also  will 
founder." 

II 

I  looked  to  the  weather  side,  and  the  summer  had 
departed.  The  sea  was  rocking,  and  shaken  with 
gathering  wrath.  Upon  its  surface  sat  mighty  mists, 
which  grouped  themselves  into  arches  and  long 
cathedral  aisles.  Down  one  of  these,  with  the  fiery 


De  Quincey  157 

pace  of  a  quarrel  from  a  cross-bow,  ran  a  frigate 
right  athwart  our  course.  "  Are  they  mad  ?  "  some 
voice  exclaimed  from  our  deck.  "  Do  they  woo 
their  ruin  ?  "  But  in  a  moment,  as  she  was  close 
upon  us,  some  impulse  of  a  heady  current  or  local 
vortex  gave  a  wheeling  bias  to  her  course,  and  off 
she  forged  without  a  shock.  As  she  ran  past  us, 
high  aloft  amongst  the  shrouds  stood  the  lady  of  the 
pinnace.  The  deeps  opened  ahead  in  malice  to 
receive  her,  towering  surges  of  foam  ran  after  her, 
the  billows  were  fierce  to  catch  her.  But  far  away 
she  was  borne  into  desert  spaces  of  the  sea:  whilst 
still  by  sight  I  followed  her,  as  she  ran  before  the 
howling  gale,  chased  by  angry  sea-birds  and  by 
maddening  billows ;  still  I  saw  her,  as  at  the  mo- 
ment when  she  ran  past  us,  standing  amongst  the 
shrouds,  with  her  white  draperies  streaming  before 
the  wind.  There  she  stood,  with  hair  dishevelled, 
one  hand  clutched  amongst  the  tackling  —  rising, 
sinking,  fluttering,  trembling,  praying;  there  for 
leagues  I  saw  her  as  she  stood,  raising  at  intervals 
one  hand  to  heaven,  amidst  the  fiery  crests  of  the 
pursuing  waves  and  the  raving  of  the  storm ;  until 
at  last,  upon  a  sound  from  afar  of  malicious  laughter 
and  mockery,  all  was  hidden  for  ever  in  driving 
showers;  and  afterwards,  but  when  I  know  not, 
nor  how. 

Ill 

Sweet  funeral  bells  from  some  incalculable  dis- 
tance, wailing  over  the  dead  that  die  before  the 
dawn,  awakened  me  as  I  slept  in  a  boat  moored  to 
some  familiar  shore.  The  morning  twilight  even 
then  was  breaking;  and,  by  the  dusky  revelations 


158  Best  English  Essays 

which  it  spread,  I  saw  a  girl,  adorned  with  a  gar- 
land of  white  roses  about  her  head  for  some  great 
festival,  running  along  the  solitary  strand  in  ex- 
tremity of  haste.  Her  running  was  the  running  of 
panic ;  and  often  she  looked  back  as  to  some  dread- 
ful enemy  in  the  rear.  But,  when  I  leaped  ashore, 
and  followed  on  her  steps  to  warn  her  of  a  peril  in 
front,  alas !  from  me  she  fled  as  from  another  peril, 
and  vainly  I  shouted  to  her  of  quicksands  that  lay 
ahead.  Faster  and  faster  she  ran  ;  round  a  promon- 
tory of  rocks  she  wheeled  out  of  sight ;  in  an  instant 
I  also  wheeled  round  it,  but  only  to  see  the  treacher- 
ous sands  gathering  above  her  head.  Already  her 
person  was  buried;  only  the  fair  young  head  and 
the  diadem  of  white  roses  around  it  were  still  visible 
to  the  pitying  heavens ;  and,  last  of  all,  was  visible 
one  white  marble  arm.  I  saw  by  the  early  twilight 
this  fair  young  head,  as  it  was  sinking  down  to 
darkness  —  saw  this  marble  arm,  as  it  rose  above 
her  head  and  her  treacherous  grave,  tossing,  falter- 
ing, rising,  clutching,  as  at  some  false  deceiving 
hand  stretched  out  from  the  clouds  —  saw  this  mar- 
ble arm  uttering  her  dying  hope,  and  then  utter- 
ing her  dying  despair.  The  head,  the  diadem,  the 
arm  —  these  all  had  sunk ;  at  last  over  these  also 
the  cruel  quicksand  had  closed ;  and  no  memorial 
of  the  fair  young  girl  remained  on  earth,  except  my 
own  solitary  tears,  and  the  funeral  bells  from  the 
desert  seas,  that,  rising  again  more  softly,  sang  a 
requiem  over  the  grave  of  the  buried  child,  and  over 
her  blighted  dawn. 

I  sat,  and  wept  in  secret  the  tears  that  men  have 
ever  given  to  the  memory  of  those  that  died  before 
the  dawn,  and  by  the  treachery  of  earth,  our  mother. 


De  Quincey  159 

But  suddenly  the  tears  and  funeral  bells  were  hushed 
by  a  shout  as  of  many  nations,  and  by  a  roar  as  from 
some  great  king's  artillery,  advancing  rapidly  along 
the  valleys,  and  heard  afar  by  echoes  from  the  moun- 
tains. "  Hush !  "  I  said,  as  I  bent  my  ear  earth- 
wards to  listen  —  "  hush !  —  this  either  is  the  very 
anarchy  of  strife,  or  else  "  —  and  then  I  listened 
more  profoundly,  and  whispered  as  I  raised  my 
head  —  "  or  else,  oh,  heavens !  it  is  victory  that  is 
final,  victory  that  swallows  up  all  strife." 

IV 

Immediately,  in  trance,  I  was  carried  over  land 
and  sea  to  some  distant  kingdom,  and  placed  upon 
a  triumphal  car,  amongst  companions  crowned  with 
laurel.  The  darkness  of  gathering  midnight,  brood- 
ing over  all  the  land,  hid  from  us  the  mighty  crowds 
that  were  weaving  restlessly  about  ourselves  as  a 
centre :  we  heard  them,  but  saw  them  not.  Tidings 
had  arrived,  within  an  hour,  of  a  grandeur  that 
measured  itself  against  centuries ;  too  full  of  pathos 
they  were,  too  full  of  joy,  to  utter  themselves  by 
other  language  than  by  tears,  by  restless  anthems, 
and  "  Te  Deums  "  reverberated  from  the  choirs  and 
orchestras  of  earth.  These  tidings  we  that  sat  upon 
the  laurelled  car  had  it  for  our  privilege  to  publish 
amongst  all  nations.  And  already,  by  signs  audible 
through  the  darkness,  by  snortings  and  tramplings, 
our  angry  horses,  that  knew  no  fear  of  fleshly 
weariness,  upbraided  us  with  delay.  Wherefore 
teas  it  that  we  delayed?  We  waited  for  a  secret 
word,  that  should  bear  witness  to  the  hope  of  na- 
tions as  now  accomplished  for  ever.  At  midnight 


160  Best  English  Essays 

the  secret  word  arrived ;  which  word  was  —  Wat- 
erloo and  Recovered  Christendom!  The  dreadful 
word  shone  by  its  own  light;  before  us  it  went; 
high  above  our  leaders'  heads  it  rode,  and  spread  a 
golden  light  over  the  paths  which  we  traversed. 
Every  city,  at  the  presence  of  the  secret  word,  threw 
open  its  gates.  The  rivers  were  conscious  as  we 
crossed.  All  the  forests,  as  we  ran  along  their  mar- 
gins, shivered  in  homage  to  the  secret  word.  And 
the  darkness  comprehended  it. 

Two  hours  after  midnight  we  approached  a 
mighty  Minster.  Its  gates,  which  rose  to  the  clouds, 
were  closed.  But,  when  the  dreadful  word  that 
rode  before  us  reached  them  with  its  golden  light, 
silently  they  moved  back  upon  their  hinges ;  and  at 
a  flying  gallop  our  equipage  entered  the  grand  aisle 
of  the  cathedral.  Headlong  was  our  pace;  and  at 
every  altar,  in  the  little  chapels  and  oratories  to  the 
right  hand  and  left  of  our  course,  the  lamps,  dying 
or  sickening,  kindled  anew  in  sympathy  with  the 
secret  word  that  was  flying  past.  Forty  leagues  we 
might  have  run  in  the  cathedral,  and  as  yet  no 
strength  of  morning  light  had  reached  us,  when 
before  us  we  saw  the  aerial  galleries  of  organ  and 
choir.  Every  pinnacle  of  the  fretwork,  every  station 
of  advantage  amongst  the  traceries,  was  crested  by 
white-robed  choristers  that  sang  deliverance;  that 
wept  no  more  tears,  as  once  their  fathers  had  wept ; 
but  at  intervals  that  sang  together  to  the  generations, 
saying, 

"  Chant  the  deliverer's  praise  in  every  tongue," 

and  receiving  answers  from  afar, 

"  Such  as  once  in  heaven  and  earth  were  sung." 


De  Quincey  161 

And  of  their  chanting  was  no  end ;  of  our  headlong 
pace  was  neither  pause  nor  slackening. 

Thus  as  we  ran  like  torrents  —7  thus  as  we  swept 
with  bridal  rapture  over  the  Campo  Santo  of  the 
cathedral  graves  —  suddenly  we  became  aware  of 
a  vast  necropolis  rising  upon  the  far-off  horizon  — 
a  city  of  sepulchres,  built  within  the  saintly  cathe- 
dral for  the  warrior  dead  that  rested  from  their 
feuds  on  earth.  Of  purple  granite  was  the  necropo- 
lis ;  yet,  in  the  first  minute,  it  lay  like  a  purple 
stain  upon  the  horizon,  so  mighty  was  the  distance. 
In  the  second  minute  it  trembled  through  many 
changes,  growing  into  terraces  and  towers  of  won- 
drous altitude,  so  mighty  was  the  pace.  In  the  third 
minute  already,  with  our  dreadful  gallop,  we  were 
entering  its  suburbs.  Vast  sarcophagi  rose  on  every 
side,  having  towers  and  turrets  that,  upon  the  limits 
of  the  central  aisle,  strode  forward  with  haughty 
intrusion,  that  ran  back  with  mighty  shadows  into 
answering  recesses.  Every  sarcophagus  showed 
many  bas-reliefs  —  bas-reliefs  of  battles  and  of 
battle-fields ;  battles  from  forgotten  ages,  battles 
from  yesterday ;  battle-fields  that,  long  since,  nature 
had  healed  and  reconciled  to  herself  with  the  sweet 
oblivion  of  flowers  ;  battle-fields  that  were  yet  angry 
and  crimson  with  carnage.  Where  the  terraces  ran, 
there  did  we  run ;  where  the  towers  curved,  there 
did  we  curve.  With  the  flight  of  swallows  our 
horses  swept*  round  every  angle.  Like  rivers  in 
flood  wheeling  round  headlands,  like  hurricanes  that 
ride  into  the  secrets  of  forests,  faster  than  ever 
light  unwove  the  mazes  of  darkness,  our  flying 
equipage  carried  earthly  passions,  kindled  warrior 
instincts,  amongst  the  dust  that  lay  around  us  — 


1 62  Best  English  Essays 

dust  oftentimes  of  our  noble  fathers  that  had  slept 
in  God  from  Creci  to  Trafalgar.  And  now  had  we 
reached  the  last  sarcophagus,  now  were  we  abreast 
of  the  last  bas-relief,  already  had  we  recovered  the 
arrow-like  flight  of  the  illimitable  central  aisle,  when 
coming  up  this  aisle  to  meet  us  we  beheld  afar  off  a 
female  child,  that  rode  in  a  carriage  as  frail  as 
flowers.  The  mists  which  went  before  her  hid  the 
fawns  that  drew  her,  but  could  not  hide  the  shells 
and  tropic  flowers  with  which  she  played  —  but 
could  not  hide  the  lovely  smiles  by  which  she  ut- 
tered her  trust  in  the  mighty  cathedral,  and  in  the 
cherubim  that  looked  down  upon  her  from  the 
mighty  shafts  of  its  pillars.  Face  to  face  she  was 
meeting  us ;  face  to  face  she  rode,  as  if  danger  there 
were  none.  "  Oh,  baby !  "  I  exclaimed,  "  shalt  thou 
be  the  ransom  for  Waterloo?  Must  we,  that  carry 
tidings  of  great  joy  to  every  people,  be  messengers 
of  ruin  to  thee !  "  In  horror  I  rose  at  the  thought ; 
but  then  also,  in  horror  at  the  thought,  rose  one  that 
was  sculptured  on  a  bas-relief  —  a  Dying  Trum- 
peter. Solemnly  from  the  field  of  battle  he  rose  to 
his  feet ;  and,  unslinging  his  stony  trumpet,  carried 
it,  in  his  dying  anguish,  to  his  stony  lips  —  sounding 
once,  and  yet  once  again ;  proclamation  that,  in  thy 
ears,  oh,  baby !  spoke  from  the  battlements  of  death. 
Immediately  deep  shadows  fell  between  us,  and 
aboriginal  silence.  The  choir  had  ceased  to  sing. 
The  hoofs  of  our  horses,  the  dreadful-  rattle  of  our 
harness,  the  groaning  of  our  wheels,  alarmed  the 
graves  no  more.  By  horror  the  bas-relief  had  been 
unlocked  unto  life.  By  horror  we,  that  were  so  full 
of  life,  we  men  and  our  horses,  with  their  fiery  fore- 
legs rising  in  mid-air  to  their  everlasting  gallop, 


De  Quincey  163 

were  frozen  to  a  bas-relief.  Then  a  third  time  the 
trumpet  sounded ;  the  seals  were  taken  off  all  pulses ; 
life,  and  the  frenzy  of  life,  tore  into  their  channels 
again;  again  the  choir  burst  forth  in  sunny  gran- 
deur, as  from  the  muffling  of  storms  and  darkness ; 
again  the  thunderings  of  our  horses  carried  tempta- 
tion into  the  graves.  One  cry  burst  from  our  lips, 
as  the  clouds,  drawing  off  from  the  aisle,  showed  it 
empty  before  us.  —  "  Whither  has  the  infant  fled  ? 
—  is  the  young  child  caught  up  to  God  ?  "  Lo !  afar 
off,  in  a  vast  recess,  rose  three  mighty  windows  to 
the  clouds ;  and  on  a  level  with  their  summits,  at 
height  insuperable  to  man,  rose  an  altar  of  purest 
alabaster.  On  its  eastern  face  was  trembling  a 
crimson  glory.  A  glory  was  it  from  the  reddening 
dawn  that  now  streamed  through  the  windows? 
Was  it  from  the  crimson  robes  of  the  martyrs 
painted  on  the  windows?  Was  it  from  the  bloody 
bas-reliefs  of  earth?  There,  suddenly,  within  that 
crimson  radiance,  rose  the  apparition  of  a  woman's 
head,  and  then  of  a  woman's  figure.  The  child  it 
was  —  grown  up  to  woman's  height.  Clinging  to 
the  horns  of  the  altar,  voiceless  she  stood  —  sinking, 
rising,  raving,  despairing ;  and  behind  the  volume  of 
incense  that,  night  and  day,  streamed  upwards  from 
the  altar,  dimly  was  seen  the  fiery  font,  and  the 
shadow  of  that  dreadful  being  who  should  have  bap- 
tised her  with  the  baptism  of  death.  But  by  her  side 
was  kneeling  her  better  angel,  that  hid  his  face  with 
wings ;  that  wept  and  pleaded  for  her;  that  prayed 
when  she  could  not;  that  fought  with  Heaven  by 
tears  for  her  deliverance ;  which  also,  as  he  raised  his 
immortal  countenance  from  his  wings,  I  saw,  by  the 
glory  in  his  eye,  that  from  Heaven  he  had  won  at  last. 


164  Best  English  Essays 


V 


Then  was  completed  the  passion  of  the  mighty 
fugue.  The  golden  tubes  of  the  organ,  which  as  yet 
had  but  muttered  at  intervals  —  gleaming  amongst 
clouds  and  surges  of  incense  —  threw  up,  as  from 
fountains  unfathomable,  columns  of  heart-shattering 
music.  Choir  and  anti-choir  were  filling  fast  with 
unknown  voices.  Thou  also,  Dying  Trumpeter, 
with  thy  love  that  was  victorious,  and  thy  anguish 
that  was  finishing,  didst  enter  the  tumult ;  trumpet 
and  echo  —  farewell  love,  and  farewell  anguish  — 
rang  through  the  dreadful  sanctus.  Oh,  darkness 
of  the  grave !  that  from  the  crimson  altar  and  from 
the  fiery  font  wert  visited  and  searched  by  the  efful- 
gence in  the  angel's  eye  —  were  these  indeed  thy 
children?  Pomps  of  life,  that,  from  the  burials  of 
centuries,  rose  again  to  the  voice  of  perfect  joy,  did 
ye  indeed  mingle  with  the  festivals  of  Death  ?  Lo ! 
as  I  looked  back  for  seventy  leagues  through  the 
mighty  cathedral,  I  saw  the  quick  and  the  dead  that 
sang  together  to  God,  together  that  sang  to  the 
generations  of  man.  All  the  hosts  of  jubilation,  like 
armies  that  ride  in  pursuit,  moved  with  one  step. 
Us,  that,  with  laurelled  heads,  were  passing  from 
the  cathedral,  they  overtook,  and,  as  with  a  garment, 
they  wrapped  us  round  with  thunders  greater  than 
our  own.  As  brothers  we  moved  together;  to  the 
dawn  that  advanced,  to  the  stars  that  fled;  render- 
ing thanks  to  God  in  the  highest  —  that,  having  hid 
His  face  through  one  generation  behind  thick  clouds 
of  War,  once  again  was  ascending,  from  the  Campo 
Santo  of  Waterloo  was  ascending,  in  the  visions 


De  Quincey  165 

of  Peace;  rendering  thanks  for  thee,  young  girl! 
whom  having  overshadowed  with  His  ineffable 
passion  of  death,  suddenly  did  God  relent,  suffered 
thy  angel  to  turn  aside  His  arm,  and  even  in  thee, 
sister  unknown !  shown  to  me  for  a  moment  only  to 
be  hidden  for  ever,  found  an  occasion  to  glorify  His 
goodness.  A  thousand  times,  amongst  the  phan- 
toms of  sleep,  have  I  seen  thee  entering  the  gates  of 
the  golden  dawn,  with  the  secret  word  riding  before 
thee,  with  the  armies  of  the  grave  behind  thee,  — 
seen  thee  sinking,  rising,  raving,  despairing;  a 
thousand  times  in  the  worlds  of  sleep  have  seen  thee 
followed  by  God's  angel  through  storms,  through 
desert  seas,  through  the  darkness  of  quicksands, 
through  dreams  and  the  dreadful  revelations  that 
are  in  dreams ;  only  that  at  the  last,  with  one  sling 
of  His  victorious  arm,  He  might  snatch  thee  back 
from  ruin,  and  might  emblazon  in  thy  deliverance 
the  endless  resurrections  of  His  love! 


LEVANA  AND  OUR  LADIES  OF  SORROW 
(Suspiria  de  Profundis) 

OFTENTIMES  at  Oxford  I  saw  Levana  in  my 
dreams.  I  knew  her  by  her  Roman  symbols. 
Who  is  Levana?  Reader,  that  do  not  pretend  to 
have  leisure  for  very  much  scholarship,  you  will 
not  be  angry  with  me  for  telling  you.  Levana  was 
the  Roman  goddess  that  performed  for  the  new-born 
infant  the  earliest  office  of  ennobling  kindness,  — 
typical,  by  its  mode,  of  that  grandeur  which  belongs 
to  man  everywhere,  and  of  that  benignity  in  powers 


1 66  Best  English  Essays 

invisible  which  even  in  Pagan  worlds  sometimes 
descends  to  sustain  it.  At  the  very  moment  of  birth, 
just  as  the  infant  tasted  for  the  first  time  the  at- 
mosphere of  our  troubled  planet,  it  was  laid  on  the 
ground.  That  might  bear  different  interpretations. 
But  immediately,  lest  so  grand  a  creature  should 
grovel  there  for  more  than  one  instant,  either  the 
paternal  hand,  as  proxy  for  the  goddess  Levana,  or 
some  near  kinsman,  as  proxy  for  the  father,  raised 
it  upright,  bade  it  look  erect  as  the  king  of  all  this 
world,  and  presented  its  forehead  to  the  stars,  say- 
ing, perhaps,  in  his  heart,  "  Behold  what  is  greater 
than  yourselves !  "  This  symbolic  act  represented 
the  function  of  Levana.  And  that  mysterious  lady, 
who  never  revealed  her  face  (except  to  me  in 
dreams),  but  always  acted  by  delegation,  had  her 
name  from  the  Latin  verb  (as  still  it  is  the  Italian 
verb)  levare,  to  raise  aloft. 

This  is  the  explanation  of  Levana.  And  hence  it 
has  arisen  that  some  people  have  understood  by 
Levana  the  tutelary  power  that  controls  the  educa- 
tion of  the  nursery.  She,  that  would  not  suffer  at 
his  birth  even  a  prefigurative  or  mimic  degradation 
for  her  awful  ward,  far  less  could  be  supposed  to 
suffer  the  real  degradation  attaching  to  the  non- 
development  of  his  powers.  She  therefore  watches 
over  human  education.  Now,  the  word  educo,  with 
the  penultimate  short,  was  derived  (by  a  process 
often  exemplified  in  the  crystallisation  of  lan- 
guages) from  the  word  educo,  with  the  penultimate 
long.  Whatsoever  educes,  or  develops,  educates. 
By  the  education  of  Levana,  therefore,  is  meant,  — 
not  the  poor  machinery  that  moves  by  spelling-books 
and  grammars,  but  by  that  mighty  system  of  central 


De  Quincey  167 

forces  hidden  in  the  deep  bosom  of  human  life, 
which  by  passion,  by  strife,  by  temptation,  by  the 
energies  of  resistance,  works  for  ever  upon  children, 
—  resting  not  day  or  night,  any  more  than  the 
mighty  wheel  of  day  and  night  themselves,  whose 
moments,  like  restless  spokes,  are  glimmering  for 
ever  as  they  revolve. 

If,  then,  these  are  the  ministries  by  which  Levana 
works,  how  profoundly  must  she  reverence  the 
agencies  of  grief !  But  you,  reader,  think  that  chil- 
dren generally  are  not  liable  to  grief  such  as  mine. 
There  are  two  senses  in  the  word  generally,  —  the 
sense  of  Euclid,  where  it  means  universally  (or  in 
the  whole  extent  of  the  genus},  and  a  foolish  sense 
of  this  world,  where  it  means  usually.  Now,  I  am 
far  from  saying  that  children  universally  are  capable 
of  grief  like  mine.  But  there  are  more  than  you 
ever  heard  of  who  die  of  grief  in  this  island  of  ours. 
I  will  tell  you  a  common  case.  The  rules  of  Eton 
require  that  a  boy  on  the  foundation  should  be  there 
twelve  years :  he  is  superannuated  at  eighteen ;  con- 
sequently he  must  come  at  six.  Children  torn  away 
from  mothers  and  sisters  at  that  age  not  unfre- 
quently  die.  I  speak  of  what  I  know.  The  com- 
plaint is  not  entered  by  the  registrar  as  grief;  but 
that  it  is.  Grief  of  that  sort,  and  at  that  age,  has 
killed  more  than  ever  have  been  counted  amongst 
its  martyrs. 

Therefore  it  is  that  Levana  often  communes  with 
the  powers  that  shake  man's  heart;  therefore  it  is 
that  she  dotes  upon  grief.  "  These  "ladies,"  said  I 
softly  to  myself,  on  seeing  the  ministers  with  whom 
Levana  was  conversing,  "  these  are  the  Sorrows ; 
and  they  are  three  in  number:  as  the  Graces  are 


1 68  Best  English  Essays 

three,  who  dress  man's  life  with  beauty ;  the  Parcae 
are  three,  who  weave  the  dark  arras  of  man's  life 
in  their  mysterious  loom  always  with  colours  sad  in 
part,  sometimes  angry  with  tragic  crimson  and 
black ;  the  Furies  are  three,  who  visit  with  retribu- 
tions called  from  the  other  side  of  the  grave  offences 
that  walk  upon  this ;  and  once  even  the  Muses  were 
but  three,  who  fit  the  harp,  the  trumpet,  or  the  lute, 
to  the  great  burdens  of  man's  impassioned  creations. 
These  are  the  Sorrows ;  all  three  of  whom  I  know." 
The  last  words  I  say  now;  but  in  Oxford  I  said, 
"  one  of  whom  I  know,  and  the  others  too  surely  I 
shall  know."  For  already,  in  my  fervent  youth,  I 
saw  (dimly  relieved  upon  the  dark  background  of 
my  dreams)  the  imperfect  lineaments  of  the  awful 
Sisters. 

These  Sisters  —  by  what  name  shall  we  call  them  ? 
If  I  say  simply  "  The  Sorrows,"  there  will  be  a 
chance  of  mistaking  the  term ;  it  might  be  under- 
stood of  individual  sorrow,  —  separate  cases  of  sor- 
row,— whereas  I  want  a  term  expressing  the  mighty 
abstractions  that  incarnate  themselves  in  all  individ- 
ual sufferings  of  man's  heart,  and  I  wish  to  have 
these  abstractions  presented  as  impersonations,  — 
that  is,  as  clothed  with  human  attributes  of  life,  and 
with  functions  pointing  to  flesh.  Let  us  call  them, 
therefore,  Our  Ladies  of  Sorrow. 

I  know  them  thoroughly,  and  have  walked  in  all 
their  kingdoms.  Three  sisters  they  are,  of  one  mys- 
terious household ;  and  their  paths  are  wide  apart ; 
but  of  their  dominion  there  is  no  end.  Them  I  saw 
often  conversing  with  Levana,  and  sometimes  about 
myself.  Do  they  talk,  then  ?  O  no !  Mighty  phan- 
toms like  these  disdain  the  infirmities  of  language. 


De  Quincey  169 

They  may  utter  voices  through  the  organs  of  man 
when  they  dwell  in  human  hearts,  but  amongst 
themselves  is  no  voice  nor  sound ;  eternal  silence 
reigns  in  their  kingdoms.  They  spoke  not  as  they 
talked  with  Levana ;  they  whispered  not ;  they  sang 
not;  though  oftentimes  methought  they  might  have 
sung:  for  I  upon  earth  had  heard  their  mysteries 
oftentimes  deciphered  by  harp  and  timbrel,  by  dul- 
cimer and  organ.  Like  God,  whose  servants  they 
are,  they  utter  their  pleasure  not  by  sounds  that 
perish,  or  by  words  that  go  astray,  but  by  signs  in 
heaven,  by  changes  on  earth,  by  pulses  in  secret 
rivers,  heraldries  painted  on  darkness,  and  hiero- 
glyphics written  on  the  tablets  of  the  brain.  They 
wheeled  in  mazes;  /  spelled  the  steps.  They  tele- 
graphed from  afar;  /  read  the  signals.  They  con- 
spired together;  and  on  the  mirrors  of  darkness 
my  eye  traced  the  plots.  Theirs  were  the  symbols ; 
mine  are  the  words. 

What  is  it  the  Sisters  are?  What  is  it  that  they 
do  ?  Let  me  describe  their  form  and  their  presence, 
if  form  it  were  that  still  fluctuated  in  its  outline,  or 
presence  it  were  that  for  ever  advanced  to  the  front 
or  for  ever  receded  amongst  shades. 

The  eldest  of  the  three  is  named  Mater  Lachry- 
marum,  Our  Lady  of  Tears.  She  it  is  that  night 
and  day  raves  and  moans,  calling  for  vanished  faces. 
She  stood  in  Rama,  where  a  voice  was  heard  of 
lamentation,  —  Rachel  weeping  for  her  children, 
and  refusing  to  be  comforted.  She  it  was  that  stood 
in  Bethlehem  on  the  night  when  Herod's  sword 
swept  its  nurseries  of  Innocents,  and  the  little  feet 
were  stiffened  for  ever  which,  heard  at  times  as 
they  trotted  along  floors  overhead,  woke  pulses  of 


170  Best  English  Essays 

love  in  household  hearts  that  were  not  unmarked  in 
heaven.  Her  eyes  are  sweet  and  subtle,  wild  and 
sleepy,  by  turns ;  oftentimes  rising  to  the  clouds, 
oftentimes  challenging  the  heavens.  She  wears  a 
diadem  round  her  head.  And  I  knew  by  childish 
memories  that  she  could  go  abroad  upon  the  winds, 
when  she  heard  the  sobbing  of  litanies,  or  the  thun- 
dering of  organs,  and  when  she  beheld  the  muster- 
ing of  summer  clouds.  This  Sister,  the  elder,  it  is, 
that  carries  keys  more  than  papal  at  her  girdle, 
which  open  every  cottage  and  every  palace.  She, 
to  my  knowledge,  sat  all  last  summer  by  the  bedside 
of  the  blind  beggar,  him  that  so  often  and  so  gladly 
I  talked  with,  whose  pious  daughter,  eight  years  old, 
with  the  sunny  countenance,  resisted  the  temptations 
of  play  and  village  mirth,  to  travel  all  day  long  on 
dusty  roads  with  her  afflicted  father.  For  this  did 
God  send  her  a  great  reward.  In  the  spring  time 
of  the  year,  and  whilst  yet  her  own  spring  was  bud- 
ding, He  recalled  her  to  himself.  But  her  blind 
father  mourns  for  ever  over  her:  still  he  dreams  at 
midnight  that  the  little  guiding  hand  is  locked 
within  his  own;  and  still  he  wakens  to  a  darkness 
that  is  now  within  a  second  and  a  deeper  darkness. 
This  Mater  Lachrymarum  also  has  been  sitting  all 
this  winter  of  1844-5  within  the  bedchamber  of  the 
Czar,  bringing  before  his  eyes  a  daughter  (not  less 
pious)  that  vanished  to  God  not  less  suddenly,  and 
left  behind  her  a  darkness  not  less  profound.  By 
the  power  of  the  keys  it  is  that  Our  Lady  of  Tears 
glides,  a  ghostly  intruder,  into  the  chambers  of 
sleepless  men,  sleepless  women,  sleepless  children, 
from  Ganges  to  the  Nile,  from  Nile  to  Mississippi. 
And  her,  because  she  is  the  first-born  of  her  house, 


De  Quincey  171 

and  has  the  widest  empire,  let  us  honour  with  the 
title  of  "  Madonna." 

The  second  Sister  is  called  Mater  Suspiriorum, 
Our  Lady  of  Sighs.  She  never  scales  the  clouds, 
nor  walks  abroad  upon  the  winds.  She  wears  no 
diadem.  And  her  eyes,  if  they  were  ever  seen, 
would  be  neither  sweet  nor  subtle;  no  man  could 
read  their  story ;  they  would  be  found  filled  with 
perishing  dreams,  and  with  wrecks  of  forgotten 
delirium.  But  she  raises  not  her  eyes ;  her  head,  on 
which  sits  a  dilapidated  turban,  droops  for  ever,  for 
ever  fastens  on  the  dust.  She  weeps  not.  She 
groans  not.  But  she  sighs  inaudibly  at  intervals. 
Her  sister,  Madonna,  is  oftentimes  stormy  and 
frantic,  raging  in  the  highest  against  heaven,  and 
demanding  back  her  darlings.  But  Our  Lady  of 
Sighs  never  clamours,  never  defies,  dreams  not  of 
rebellious  aspirations.  She  is  humble  to  abjectness. 
Hers  is  the  meekness  that  belongs  to  the  hopeless. 
Murmur  she  may,  but  it  is  in  her  sleep.  Whisper 
she  may,  but  it  is  to  herself  in  the  twilight.  Mutter 
she  does  at  times,  but  it  is  in  solitary  places  that  are 
desolate  as  she  is  desolate,  in  ruined  cities,  and  when 
the  sun  has  gone  down  to  his  rest.  This  Sister  is 
the  visitor  of  the  Pariah,  of  the  Jew,  of  the  bonds- 
man to  the  oar  in  the  Mediterranean  galleys ;  of  the 
English  criminal  in  Norfolk  Island,  blotted  out  from 
the  books  of  remembrance  in  sweet  far-off  England ; 
of  the  baffled  penitent  reverting  his  eyes  for  ever 
upon  a  solitary  grave,  which  to  him  seems  the 
altar  overthrown  of  some  past  and  bloody  sacrifice, 
on  which  altar  no  oblations  can  now  be  availing, 
whether  towards  pardon  that  he  might  implore,  or 
towards  reparation  that  he  might  attempt.  Every 


172  Best  English  Essays 

slave  that  at  noonday  looks  up  to  the  tropical  sun 
with  timid  reproach,  as  he  points  with  one  hand  to 
the  earth,  our  general  mother,  but  for  him  a  step- 
mother, as  he  points  with  the  other  hand  to  the 
Bible,  our  general  teacher,  but  against  him  sealed 
and  sequestered;  every  woman  sitting  in  dark- 
ness, without  love  to  shelter  her  head,  or  hope  to 
illumine  her  solitude,  because  the  heaven-born  in- 
stincts kindling  in  her  nature  germs  of  holy  affec- 
tions, which  God  implanted  in  her  womanly  bosom, 
having  been  stifled  by  social  necessities,  now  burn 
sullenly  to  waste,  like  sepulchral  lamps  amongst  the 
ancients ;  every  nun  defrauded  of  her  unreturning 
May-time  by  wicked  kinsman,  whom  God  will 
judge ;  every  captive  in  every  dungeon  ;  all  that  are 
betrayed,  and  all  that  are  rejected ;  outcasts  by  tra- 
ditionary law,  and  children  of  hereditary  disgrace: 
all  these  walk  with  Our  Lady  of  Sighs.  She  also 
carries  a  key ;  but  she  needs  it  little.  For  her  king- 
dom is  chiefly  amongst  the  tents  of  Shem,  and  the 
houseless  vagrants  of  every  clime.  Yet  in  the  very 
highest  ranks  of  man  she  finds  chapels  of  her  own ; 
and  even  in  glorious  England  there  are  some  that, 
to  the  world,  carry  their  heads  as  proudly  as  the 
reindeer,  who  yet  secretly  have  received  her  mark 
upon  their  foreheads. 

But  the  third    Sister,   who   is   also  the   young- 
est   !     Hush!    whisper  whilst  we  talk  of  her! 

Her  kingdom  is  not  large,  or  else  no  flesh  should 
live;  but  within  that  kingdom  all  power  is  hers. 
Her  head,  turreted  like  that  of  Cybele,  rises  almost 
beyond  the  reach  of  sight.  She  droops  not;  and 
her  eyes,  rising  so  high,  might  be  hidden  by  dis- 
tance. But,  being  what  they  are,  they  cannot  be 


De  Quincey  173 

hidden :  through  the  treble  veil  of  crape  which  she 
wears  the  fierce  light  of  a  blazing  misery,  that  rests 
not  for  matins  or  for  vespers,  for  noon  of  day  or 
noon  of  night,  for  ebbing  or  for  flowing  tide,  may  be 
read  from  the  very  ground.  She  is  the  defier  of 
God.  She  also  is  the  mother  of  lunacies,  and  the 
suggestress  of  suicides.  Deep  lie  the  roots  of  her 
power ;  but  narrow  is  the  nation  that  she  rules.  For 
she  can  approach  only  those  in  whom  a  profound 
nature  has  been  upheaved  by  central  convulsions ; 
in  whom  the  heart  trembles  and  the  brain  rocks 
under  conspiracies  of  tempest  from  without  and 
tempest  from  within.  Madonna  moves  with  uncer- 
tain steps,  fast  or  slow,  but  still  with  tragic  grace. 
Our  Lady  of  Sighs  creeps  timidly  and  stealthily. 
But  this  youngest  Sister  moves  with  incalculable 
motions,  bounding,  and  with  tiger's  leaps.  She 
carries  no  key;  for,  though  coming  rarely  amongst 
men,  she  storms  all  doors  at  which  she  is  permitted 
to  enter  at  all.  And  her  name  is  Mater  Tenebrarum, 
—  our  Lady  of  Darkness. 

These  were  the  Semnai  Theai  or  Sublime  God- 
desses, these  were  the  Eumenides  or  Gracious  Ladies 
(so  called  by  antiquity  in  shuddering  propitiation), 
of  my  Oxford  dreams.  Madonna  spoke.  She  spoke 
by  her  mysterious  hand.  Touching  my  head,  she 
beckoned  to  Our  Lady  of  Sighs;  and  what  she 
spoke,  translated  out  of  the  signs  which  (except  in 
dreams)  no  man  reads,  was  this :  — 

"  Lo !  here  is  he  whom  in  childhood  I  dedicated 
to  my  altars.  This  is  he  that  once  I  made  my  dar- 
ling. Him  I  led  astray,  him  I  beguiled ;  and  from 
heaven  I  stole  away  his  young  heart  to  mine. 
Through  me  did  he  become  idolatrous ;  and  through 


174  Best  English  Essays 

me  it  was,  by  languishing  desires,  that  he  wor- 
shipped the  worm,  and  prayed  to  the  wormy  grave. 
Holy  was  the  grave  to  him ;  lovely  was  its  darkness ; 
saintly  its  corruption.  Him,  this  young  idolater,  I 
have  seasoned  for  thee,  dear  gentle  Sister  of  Sighs ! 
Do  thou  take  him  now  to  thy  heart,  and  season  him 
for  our  dreadful  sister.  And  thou,"  —  turning  to 
the  Mater  Tenebrarum,  she  said,  —  "  wicked  sister, 
that  temptest  and  hatest,  do  thou  take  him  from 
her.  See  that  thy  sceptre  lie  heavy  on  his  head. 
Suffer  not  woman  and  her  tenderness  to  sit  near 
him  in  his  darkness.  Banish  the  frailties  of  hope; 
wither  the  relenting  of  love ;  scorch  the  fountains  of 
tears;  curse  him  as  only  thou  canst  curse.  So  shall 
he  be  accomplished  in  the  furnace ;  so  shall  he  see 
the  things  that  ought  not  to  be  seen,  sights  that  are 
abominable,  and  secrets  that  are  unutterable.  So 
shall  he  read  elder  truths,  sad  truths,  grand  truths, 
fearful  truths.  So  shall  he  rise  again  before  he  dies. 
And  so  shall  our  commission  be  accomplished  which 
from  God  we  had,  —  to  plague  his  heart  until  we 
had  unfolded  the  capacities  of  his  spirit." 


VI 
CARLYLE 


CARLYLE: 
THE   LATTER-DAY   PROPHET 

WE  have  observed  the  immense  influence 
of  the  conversational,  familiar-letter 
style  on  modern  essay  writing;  but 
while  it  has  given  us  some  of  our  most  delight- 
ful literature,  it  is  by  no  means  the  only  influ- 
ence we  must  reckon  with.  The  influence  of 
the  pulpit  has  been  enormous  and  important.  In 
Swift  we  saw  one  form  of  preaching, — a  preach- 
ing almost  wholly  destructive  and  devoid  of  per- 
sonal inspiration.  In  Carlyle  we  find  an  original 
"  prophet,"  after  the  manner  of  the  prophets  of 
the  Old  Testament.  As  he  is  an  original  prophet 
he  is  of  course  debarred  from  a  church  that  is 
trammelled  by  the  conventions  of  time;  and 
among  a  people  whose  mission  in  the  world  is 
not  religious  in  the  sense  that  the  mission  of  the 
old  Hebrews  was  religious,  our  prophet  need  not 
be  a  distinctively  religious  man.  He  is  a  true 
prophet  none  the  less.  Such  was  Carlyle. 

Like  other  prophets,  he  must  compel  men.  He 
does  not  win  them  by  gentle  persuasion.  Rather 
he  threatens.  He  forces  attention  by  his  singu- 
larity. He  assumes  authority,  and  as  the  mouth- 

12 


178  Best  English  Essays 

piece  of  a  Greater  than  himself,  he  speaks  like 
a  sort  of  tyrant,  in  enigmas  which  men  must  un- 
ravel for  themselves,  and  which  they  do  unravel 
in  fear  and  trembling. 

For  ordinary  purposes,  Carlyle's  style  is  as  bad 
as  it  can  be.  His  only  excuse  for  capitalizing 
many  of  the  words  he  does  is  his  desire  to  make 
words  seem  to  mean  more  than  ordinarily  they 
do  mean.  His  words  seem  to  come  with  the 
utmost  difficulty,  and  indeed  we  read  that  writing 
with  him  was  a  constant  pain.  He  appears  con- 
stantly to  violate  his  own  theory  as  expressed 
in  "  Characteristics  "  that  Art  should  be  uncon- 
scious, for  in  his  writing  he  is  often  too  painfully 
conscious. 

We  can  understand  Carlyle's  style  only  when 
we  consider  its  object.  He  was  a  preacher,  and  it 
was  his  mission  to  compel  the  attention  of  men 
to  thoughts  and  duties  he  knew  they  would  be 
very  loath  to  give  heed  to.  Oddity,  mystery,  ab- 
ruptness, a  dictatorial  tone  "under  such  conditions 
are  not  only  justifiable,  but  necessary.  They  con- 
stitute the  best  art.  So  long  as  they  are  not  a 
mere  affectation,  but  are  the  sign  and  symbol  of 
a  great  utterance  and  a  high  duty,  they  are  but  the 
means  of  gaining  the  attention-  without  which  the 
whole  communication  of  thought  would  have 
proved  fruitless. 

Carlyle's  gospel  found  expression  first  of  all 
in  his  "  Sartor  Resartus,"  which  professed  to  be 
a  "philosophy  of  clothes."  This  book  was  written 


Carlyle  179 

in  his  most  difficult  style.  In  it  his  peculiar 
modes  of  expression  reach  their  extreme,  and  it 
is  not  surprising  that  he  found  difficulty  in  get- 
ting a  publisher.  He  went  to  London  in  quest  of 
one,  and  not  succeeding,  he  wrote  his  essay 
"  Characteristics,"  which  was  accepted  at  once 
by  "  Eraser's  Magazine,"  and  published  without 
alteration,  becoming  immediately  popular,  while 
"  Sartor  Resartus  "  waited  long  for  its  publisher 
and  still  longer  for  its  audience.  In  "  Charac- 
teristics "  Carlyle  had  expressed  in  simple  and 
natural  form,  with  restraint  and  little  conscious- 
ness of  effort,  the  heart  of  the  philosophy  which 
is  to  be  found  in  "  Sartor  Resartus."  If  we 
have  time  for  a  book,  and  a  book  to  be  read  line 
by  line  and  accepted  as  a  gospel,  "  Sartor  Re- 
sartus" will  well  repay  our  effort  to  master  it. 
But  if,  like  the  average  reader,  we  have  time  for 
but  a  single  essay,  the  comparatively  slight  un- 
conventionality  of  "  Characteristics  "  will  afford 
all  the  stimulus  that  we  shall  need  to  rouse  us 
to  the  full  importance  of  the  message  the  author 
has  to  convey.  As  a  model  of  style,  too,  it  is  far 
safer  for  study  and  imitation  than  any  other 
great  thing  Carlyle  ever  wrote. 


i8o  Best  English  Essays 

CHARACTERISTICS  1 
[1831] 

THE  healthy  know  not  of  their  health,  but  only 
the  sick:  this  is  the  Physician's  Aphorism; 
and  applicable  in  a  far  wider  sense  than  he  gives  it. 
We  may  say,  it  holds  no  less  in  moral,  intellectual, 
political,  poetical,  than  in  merely  corporeal  thera- 
peutics; that  wherever,  or  in  what  shape  soever, 
powers  of  the  sort  which  can  be  named  vital  are  at 
work,  herein  lies  the  test  of  their  working  right  or 
working  wrong. 

In  the  Body,  for  example,  as  all  doctors  are 
agreed,  the  first  condition  of  complete  health  is,  that 
each  organ  perform  its  function  unconsciously,  un- 
heeded; let  but  any  organ  announce  its  separate 
existence,  were  it  even  boastfully,  and  for  pleasure, 
not  for  pain,  then  already  has  one  of  those  un- 
fortunate "  false  centres  of  sensibility  "  established 
itself,  already  is  derangement  there.  The  perfection 
of  bodily  well-being  is,  that  the  collective  bodily 
activities  seem  one ;  and  be  manifested,  moreover, 
not  in  themselves,  but  in  the  action  they  accomplish. 
If  a  Dr.  Kitchiner  boast  that  his  system  is  in  high 

1  EDINBURGH  REVIEW,  No.  108.  —  i.  An  Essay  on  the  Origin 
and  Prospects  of  Man.  By  Thomas  Hope.  3  vols.  8vo.  London, 
1831. 

2.  Philosophische  Vorlesungen,  insbesondere  iiber  Philosophie  der 
Sprache  und  des  Wortes.  Geschrieben  und  vorgctragen  zu  Dresden 
im  December,  1828,  und  in  den  ersten  Tagen  des  Januars,  1829 
(Philosophical  Lectures,  especially  on  the  Philosophy  of  Lan- 
guage and  the  Gift  of  Speech.  Written  and  delivered  at  Dresden 
in  December,  1828,  and  the  early  days  of  January,  1829).  By 
Friedrich  von  Schlegel.  8vo.  Vienna,  1830. 


Carlyle  181 

order,  Dietetic  Philosophy  may  indeed  take  credit; 
but  the  true  Peptician  was  that  Countryman  who 
answered  that,  "  for  his  part,  he  had  no  system." 
(In  fact,  unity,  agreement  is  always  silent,  or  soft- 
voiced;  it  is  only  discord  that  loudly  proclaims  it- 
self.) So  long  as  the  several  elements  of  Life,  all 
fitly  adjusted,  can  pour  forth  their  movement  like 
harmonious  tuned  strings,  it  is  a  melody  and  unison ; 
Life,  from  its  mysterious  fountains,  flows  out  as  in 
celestial  music  and  diapason,  —  which  also,  like  that 
other  music  of  the  spheres,  even  because  it  is  pe- 
rennial and  complete,  without  interruption  and  with- 
out imperfection,  might  be  fabled  to  escape  the  ear. 
Thus  too,  in  some  languages,  is  the  state  of  health 
well  denoted  by  a  term  expressing  unity ;  when  we 
feel  ourselves  as  we  wish  to  be,  we  say  that  we  are 
whole. 

Few  mortals,  it  is  to  be  feared,  are  permanently 
blessed  with  that  felicity  of  "  having  no  system  " ; 
nevertheless,  most  of  us,  looking  back  on  young 
years,  may  remember  seasons  of  a  light,  aerial  trans- 
lucency  and  elasticity  and  perfect  freedom;  the 
body  had  not  yet  become  the  prison-house  of  the 
soul,  but  was  its  vehicle  and  implement,  like  a  crea- 
ture of  the  thought,  and  altogether  pliant  to  its 
bidding.  We  knew  not  that  we  had  limbs,  we  only 
lifted,  hurled  and  leapt;  through  eye  and  ear,  and 
all  avenues  of  sense,  came  clear  unimpeded  tidings 
from  without,  and  from  within  issued  clear  victo- 
rious force ;  we  stood  as  in  the  centre  of  Nature, 
giving  and  receiving,  in  harmony  with  it  all ;  unlike 
Virgil's  Husbandmen,  "  too  happy  because  we  did 
not  know  our  blessedness."  In  those  days,  health 
and  sickness  were  foreign  traditions  that  did  not 


1 82  Best  English  Essays 

concern  us ;  our  whole  being  was  as  yet  One,  the 
whole  man  like  an  incorporated  Will.  Such,  were 
Rest  or  ever-successful  Labour  the  human  lot,  might 
our  life  continue  to  be:  a  pure,  perpetual,  unre- 
garded music;  a  beam  of  perfect  white  light, 
rendering  all  things  visible,  but  itself  unseen,  even 
because  it  was  of  that  perfect  whiteness,  and  no 
irregular  obstruction  had  yet  broken  it  into  colours. 
The  beginning  of  Inquiry  is  Disease :  all  Science,  if 
we  consider  well,  as  it  must  have  originated  in  the 
feeling  of  something  being  wrong,  so  it  is  and  con- 
tinues to  be  but  Division,  Dismemberment,  and 
partial  healing  of  the  wrong.  Thus,  as  was  of  old 
written,  the  Tree  of  Knowledge  springs  from  a  root 
of  evil,  and  bears  fruits  of  good  and  evil.  Had 
Adam  remained  in  Paradise,  there  had  been  no 
Anatomy  and  no  Metaphysics. 

But,  alas,  as  the  Philosopher  declares,  "  Life  itself 
is  a  disease ;  a  working  incited  by  suffering " ; 
action  from  passion !  The  memory  of  that  first  state 
of  Freedom  and  paradisaic  Unconsciousness  has 
faded  away  into  an  ideal  poetic  dream.  We  stand 
here  too  conscious  of  many  things :  with  Knowl- 
edge, the  symptom  of  Derangement,  we  must  even 
do  our  best  to  restore  a  little  Order.  Life  is,  in  few 
instances,  and  at  rare  intervals,  the  diapason  of  a 
heavenly  melody;  oftenest  the  fierce  jar  of  disrup- 
tions and  convulsions,  which,  do  what  we  will,  there 
is  no  disregarding.  Nevertheless,  such  is  still  the 
wish  of  Nature  on  our  behalf;  in  all  vital  action, 
her  manifest  purpose  and  effort  is,  that  we  should 
be  unconscious  of  it,'  and,  like  the  peptic  Country- 
man, never  know  that  we  "  have  a  system."  For, 
indeed,  vital  action  everywhere  is  emphatically  a 


Carlyle  183 

means,  not  an  end ;  Life  is  not  given  us  for  the  mere 
sake  of  Living,  but  always  with  an  ulterior  external 
Aim :  neither  is  it  on  the  process,  on  the  means,  but 
rather  on  the  result,  that  Nature,  in  any  of  her 
doings,  is  wont  to  intrust  us  with  insight  and  voli- 
tion. Boundless  as  is  the  domain  of  man,  it  is  but 
a  small  fractional  proportion  of  it  that  he  rules  with 
Consciousness  and  by  Forethought:  what  he  can 
contrive,  nay  what  he  can  altogether  know  and  com- 
prehend, is  essentially  the  mechanical,  small;  the 
great  is  ever,  in  one  sense  or  other,  the  vital ;  it  is 
essentially  the  mysterious,  and  only  the  surface  of  it 
can  be  understood.  But  Nature,  it  might  seem, 
strives,  like  a  kind  mother,  to  hide  from  us  even  this, 
that  she  is  a  mystery :  she  will  have  us  rest  on  her 
beautiful  and  awful  bosom  as  if  it  were  our  secure 
home;  on  the  bottomless  boundless  Deep,  whereon 
all  human  things  fearfully  and  wonderfully  swim, 
she  will  have  us  walk  and  build,  as  if  the  film  which 
supported  us  there  (which  any  scratch  of  a  bare 
bodkin  will  rend  asunder,  any  sputter  of  a  pistol- 
shot  instantaneously  burn  up)  were  no  film,  but  a 
solid  rock-foundation.  For  ever  in  the  neighbour- 
hood of  an  inevitable  Death,  man  can  forget  that  he 
is  born  to  die ;  of  his  Life,  which,  strictly  meditated, 
contains  in  it  an  Immensity  and  an  Eternity,  he  can 
conceive  lightly,  as  of  a  simple  implement  where- 
with to  do  day-labour  and  earn  wages.  So  cunningly 
does  Nature,  the  mother  of  all  highest  Art,  which 
only  apes  her  from  afar,  "  body  forth  the  Finite 
from  the  Infinite " ;  and  guide  man  safe  on  his 
wondrous  path,  not  more  by  endowing  him  with 
vision,  than,  at  the  right  place,  with  blindness ! 
Under  all  her  works,  chiefly  under  her  noblest  work, 


184  Best  English  Essays 

Life,  lies  a  basis  of  Darkness,  which  she  benig- 
nantly  conceals;  in  Life  too,  the  roots  and  inward 
circulations  which  stretch  down  fearfully  to  the 
regions  of  Death  and  Night,  shall  not  hint  of  their 
existence,  and  only  the  fair  stem  with  its  leaves  and 
flowers,  shone  on  by  the  fair  sun,  shall  disclose  itself, 
and  joyfully  grow. 

However,  without  venturing  into  the  abstruse,  or 
too  eagerly  asking  Why  and  How,  in  things  where 
our  answer  must  needs  prove,  in  great  part,  an  echo 
of  the  question,  let  us  be  content  to  remark  farther, 
in  the  merely  historical  way,  how  that  Aphorism  of 
the  bodily  Physician  holds  good  in  quite  other  de- 
partments. Of  the  Soul,  with  her  activities,  we  shall 
find  it  no  less  true  than  of  the  Body :  nay,  cry  the 
Spiritualists,  is  not  that  very  division  of  the  unity, 
Man,  into  a  dualism  of  Soul  and  Body,  itself  the 
symptom  of  disease;  as,  perhaps,  your  frightful 
theory  of  Materialism,  of  his  being  but  a  Body,  and 
therefore,  at  least,  on  •  more  a  unity,  may  be  the 
paroxysm  which  was  critical,  and  the  beginning  of 
cure!  But  omitting  this,  we  observe,  with  confi- 
dence enough,  that  the  truly  strong  mind,  view  it 
as  Intellect,  as  Morality,  or  under  any  other  aspect, 
is  nowise  the  mind  acquainted  with  its  strength ; 
that  here  as  before  the  sign  of  health  is  Uncon- 
sciousness. In  our  inward,  as  in  our  outward  world, 
what  is  mechanical  lies  open  to  us :  not  what  is 
dynamical  and  has  vitality.  Of  our  Thinking,  we 
might  say,  it  is  but  the  mere  upper  surface  that  we 
shape  into  articulate  Thoughts ;  —  underneath  the 
region  of  argument  and  conscious  discourse,  lies 
the  region  of  meditation ;  here,  in  its  quiet  mys- 
terious depths,  dwells  what  vital  force  is  in  us ; 


Carlyle  185 

here,  if  aught  is  to  be  created,  and  not  merely  man- 
ufactured and  communicated,  must  the  work  go  on. 
Manufacturers  intelligible,  but  trivial;  Creation  is 
great,  and  cannot  be  understood.  Thus  if  the  De- 
bater and  Demonstrator,  whom  we  may  rank  as  the 
lowest  of  true  thinkers,  knows  what  he  has  done, 
and  how  he  did  it,  the  Artist,  whom  we  rank  as  the 
highest,  knows  not ;  must  speak  of  Inspiration,  and 
in  one  or  the  other  dialect,  call  his  work  the  gift  of 
a  divinity. 

But  on  the  whole,  "  genius  is  ever  a  secret  to 
itself  " ;  of  this  old  truth  we  have,  on  all  sides,  daily 
evidence.  The  Shakespeare  takes  no  airs  for  writ- 
ing "  Hamlet  "  and  the  "  Tempest,"  understands 
not  that  it  is  anything  surprising:  Milton,  again,  is 
more  conscious  of  his  faculty,  which  accordingly 
is  an  inferior  one.  On  the  other  hand,  what  cack- 
ling and  strutting  must  we  not  often  hear  and  see, 
when,  in  some  shape  of  academical  prolusion,  maiden 
speech,  review  article,  this  or  the  other  well-fledged 
goose  has  produced  its  goose-egg,  of  quite  measur- 
able value,  were  it  the  pink  of  its  whole  kind ;  and 
wonders  why  all  mortals  do  not  wonder ! 

Foolish  enough,  too,  was  the  College  Tutor's 
surprise  at  Walter  Shandy :  how,  though  unread  in 
Aristotle,  he  could  nevertheless  argue;  and  not 
knowing  the  name  of  any  dialectic  tool,  'handled 
them  all  to  perfection.  Is  it  the  skilfulest  anatomist 
that  cuts  the  best  figure  at  Sadler's  Wells?  or  does 
the  boxer  hit  better  for  knowing  that  he  has  a 
Hex  or  longus  and  a  flexor  brevisf  But  indeed,  as 
in  the  higher  case  of  the  Poet,  so  here  in  that  of  the 
Speaker  and  Inquirer,  the  true  force  is  an  uncon- 
scious one.  The  healthy  Understanding,  we  should 


1 86  Best  English  Essays 

say,  is  not  the  Logical,  argumentative,  but  the  In- 
tuitive ;  for  the  end  of  Understanding  is  not  to  prove 
and  find  reasons,  but  to  know  and  believe.  Of  logic, 
and  its  limits,  and  uses  and  abuses,  there  were  much 
to  be  said  and  examined ;  one  fact,  however,  which 
chiefly  concerns  us  here,  has  long  been  familiar: 
that  the  man  of  logic  and  the  man  of  insight;  the 
Rea,soner  and  the  Discoverer,  or  even  Knower,  are 
quite  separable,  —  indeed,  for  most  part,  quite  sep- 
arate characters.  In  practical  matters,  for  example, 
has  it  not  become  almost  proverbial  that  the  man  of 
logic  cannot  prosper?  This  is  he  whom  business- 
people  call  Systematic  and  Theoriser  and  Word- 
monger  ;  his  vital  intellectual  force  lies  dormant  or 
extinct,  his  whole  force  is  mechanical,  conscious : 
of  such  a  one  it  is  foreseen  that,  when  once  con- 
fronted with  the  infinite  complexities  of  the  real 
world,  his  little  compact  theorem  of  the  world  will 
be  found  wanting ;  that  unless  he  can  throw  it  over- 
board and  become  a  new  creature,  he  will  necessarily 
founder.  Nay,  in  mere  Speculation  itself,  the  most 
ineffectual  of  all  characters,  generally  speaking,  is 
your  dialectic  man-at-arms ;  were  he  armed  cap-a-pie 
in  syllogistic  mail  of  proof,  and  perfect  master  of 
logic-fence,  how  little  does  it  avail  him !  Consider 
the  old  Schoolmen,  and  their  pilgrimage  towards 
Truth :  the  faithf ulest  endeavour,  incessant  unwea- 
ried motion,  often  great  natural  vigour ;  only  no 
progress :  nothing  but  antic  feats  of  one  limb  poised 
against  the  other ;  there  they  balanced,  somersetted, 
and  made  postures ;  at  best  gyrated  swiftly,  with 
some  pleasure,  like  Spinning  Dervishes,  and  ended 
where  they  began.  So  is  it,  so  will  it  always  be, 
with  all  System-makers  and  builders  of  logical  card- 


Carlyle  187 

castles ;  of  which  class  a  certain  remnant  must,  in 
every  age,  as  they  do  in  our  own,  survive  and  build. 
Logic  is  good,  but  it  is  not  the  best.  The  Irref- 
ragable Doctor,  with  his  chains  of  induction,  his 
corollaries,  dilemmas  and  other  cunning  logical  dia- 
grams and  apparatus,  will  cast  you  a  beautiful 
horoscope,  and  speak  reasonable  things ;  neverthe- 
less your  stolen  jewel,  which  you  wanted  him  to  find 
you,  is  not  forthcoming.  Often  by  some  winged 
word,  winged  as  the  thunderbolt  is,  of  a  Luther,  a 
Napoleon,  a  Goethe,  shall  we  see  the  difficulty  split 
asunder,  and  its  secret  laid  bare;  while  the  Irref- 
ragable, with  all  his  logical  tools,  hews  at  it,  and 
hovers  round  it,  and  finds  it  on  all  hands  too  hard 
for  him. 

Again,  in  the  difference  between  Oratory  and 
Rhetoric,  as  indeed  everywhere  in  that  superiority 
of  what  is  called  the  Natural  over  the  Artificial,  we 
find  a  similar  illustration.  The  Orator  persuades 
and  carries  all  with  him,  he  knows  not  how;  the 
Rhetorician  can  prove  that  he  ought  to  have  per- 
suaded and  carried  all  with  him:  the  one  is  in  a 
state  of  healthy  unconsciousness,  as  if  he  "  had  no 
system  " ;  the  other,  in  virtue  of  regimen  and  die- 
tetic punctuality,  feels  at  best  that  "  his  system  is  in 
high  order."  So  stands  it,  in  short,  with  all  the 
forms  of  Intellect,  whether  as  directed  to  the  finding 
of  truth,  or  to  the  fit  imparting  thereof ;  to  Poetry, 
to  Eloquence,  to  depth  of  Insight,  which  is  the  basis 
of  both  these ;  always  the  characteristic  of  right 
performance  is  a  certain  spontaneity,  an  uncon- 
sciousness ;  "  the  healthy  know  not  of  their  health, 
but  only  the  sick."  So  that  the  old  precept  of  the 
critic,  as  crabbed  as  it  looked  to  his  ambitious  dis- 


1 88  Best  English  Essays 

ciple,  might  contain  in  it  a  most  fundamental  truth, 
applicable  to  us  all,  and  in  much  else  than  Liter- 
ature :  "  Whenever  you  have  written  any  sentence 
that  looks  particularly  excellent,  be  sure  to  blot  it 
out."  In  like  manner,  under  milder  phraseology, 
and  with  a  meaning  purposely  much  wider,  a  living 
Thinker  has  taught  us :  "  Of  the  Wrong  we  are 
always  conscious,  of  the  Right  never." 

But  if  such  is  the  law  with  regard  to  Speculation 
and  the  Intellectual  power  of  man,  much  more  is  it 
with  regard  to  Conduct,  and  the  power,  manifested 
chiefly  therein,  which  we  name  Moral.  "  Let  not 
thy  left  hand  know  what  thy  right  hand  doeth  " : 
whisper  not  to  thy  own  heart,  How  worthy  is  this 
action !  —  for  then  it  is  already  becoming  worthless. 
The  good  man  is  he  who  works  continually  in  well- 
doing; to  whom  well-doing  is  as  his  natural  exist- 
ence, awakening  no  astonishment,  requiring  no 
commentary;  but  there,  like  a  thing  of  course,  and 
as  if  it  could  not  but  be  so.  Self-contemplation,  on 
the  other  hand,  is  infallibly  the  symptom  of  disease, 
be  it  or  be  it  not  the  sign  of  cure.  An  unhealthy 
Virtue  is  one  that  consumes  itself  to  leanness  in 
repenting  and  anxiety ;  or,  still  worse,  that  inflates 
itself  into  dropsical  boastfulness  and  vainglory: 
either  way,  there  is  a  self-seeking;  an  unprofitable 
looking  behind  us  to  measure  the  way  we  have 
made :  whereas  the  sole  concern  is  to  walk  continu- 
ally forward,  and  make  more  way.  If  in  any  sphere 
of  man's  life,  then  in  the  Moral  sphere,  as  the  inmost 
and  most  vital  of  all,  it  is  good  that  there  be  whole- 
ness; that  there  be  unconsciousness,  which  is  the 
evidence  of  this.  Let  the  free,  reasonable  Will, 
which  dwells  in  us,  as  in  our  Holy  of  Holies,  be 


Carlyle  189 

indeed  free,  and  obeyed  like  a  Divinity,  as  is  its 
right  and  its  effort :  the  perfect  obedience  will  be  the 
silent  one.  Such  perhaps  were  the  sense  of  that 
maxim,  enunciating,  as  is  usual,  but  the  half  of 
a  truth :  To  say  that  we  have  a  clear  conscience,  is 
to  utter  a  solecism ;  had  we  never  sinned,  we  should 
have  had  no  conscience.  Were  defeat  unknown, 
neither  would  victory  be  celebrated  by  songs  of 
triumph. 

This,  true  enough,  is  an  ideal,  impossible  state 
of  being ;  yet  ever  the  goal  towards  which  our  actual 
state  of  being  strives ;  which  it  is  the  more  perfect 
the  nearer  it  can  approach.  Nor,  in  our  actual 
world,  where  Labour  must  often  prove  ineffectual; 
and  thus  in  all  senses  Light  alternate  with  Darkness, 
and  the  nature  of  an  ideal  Morality  be  much  modi- 
fied, is  the  case,  thus  far,  materially  different.  It  is 
a  fact  which  escapes  no  one,1  that,  generally  speak- 
ing, whoso  is  acquainted  with  his  worth  has  but  a 
little  stock  to  cultivate  acquaintance  with.  Above 
all,  the  public  acknowledgment  of  such  acquaint- 
ance, indicating  that  it  has  reached  quite  an  intimate 
footing,  bodes  ill.  Already,  to  the  popular  judg- 
ment, he  who  talks  much  about  Virtue  in  the  ab- 
stract, begins  to  be  suspect ;  it  is  shrewdly  guessed 
that  where  there  is  great  preaching,  there  will  be 
little  almsgiving.  Or  again,  on  a  wider  scale,  we 
can  remark  that  ages  of  Heroism  are  not  ages  of 
Moral  Philosophy ;  Virtue,  when  it  can  be  philoso- 
phised of,  has  become  aware  of  itself,  is  sickly  and 
beginning  to  decline.  A  spontaneous  habitual  all- 
pervading  spirit  of  Chivalrous  Valour  shrinks  to- 
gether, and  perks  itself  up  into  shrivelled  Points  of 
Honour;  humane  Courtesy  and  Nobleness  of  mind 


190  Best  English  Essays 

dwindle  into  punctilious  Politeness,  "  avoiding 
meats  " ;  "  paying  tithe  of  mint  and  anise,  neglect- 
ing the  weightier  matters  of  the  law."  Goodness, 
which  was  a  rule  to  itself,  must  now  appeal  to  Pre- 
cept, and  seek  strength  from  Sanctions ;  the  Free- 
will no  longer  reigns  unquestioned  and  by  divine 
right,  but  like  a  mere  earthly  sovereign,  by  expe- 
diency, by  Rewards  and  Punishments :  or  rather, 
let  us  say,  the  Freewill,  so  far  as  may  be,  has  abdi- 
cated and  withdrawn  into  the  dark,  and  a  spectral 
nightmare  of  a  necessity  usurps  its  throne ;  for  now 
that  mysterious  Self-impulse  of  the  whole  man, 
heaven-inspired,  and  in  all  senses  partaking  of  the 
Infinite,  being  captiously  questioned  in  a  finite  dia- 
lect, and  answering,  as  it  needs  must,  by  silence,  — 
is  conceived  as  non-extant,  and  only  the  outward 
Mechanism  of  it  remains  acknowledged :  of  Voli- 
tion, except  as  the  synonym  of  Desire,  we  hear 
nothing ;  of  "  Motives,"  without  any  Mover,  more 
than  enough. 

So  too,  when  the  generous  Affections  have  be- 
come wellnigh  paralytic,  we  have  the  reign  of  Sen- 
timentality. The  greatness,  the  profitableness,  at 
any  rate  the  extremely  ornamental  nature  of  high 
feeling,  and  the  luxury  of  doing  good ;  charity, 
love,  self-forgetfulness,  devotedness  and  all  manner 
of  godlike  magnanimity,  —  are  everywhere  insisted 
on,  and  pressingly  inculcated  in  speech  and  writing, 
in  prose  and  verse;  Socinian  Preachers  proclaim 
"  Benevolence "  to  all  the  four  winds,  and  have 
TRUTH  engraved  on  their  watch-seals:  unhappily 
with  little  or  no  effect.  Were  the  limbs  in  right 
walking  order,  why  so  much  demonstrating  of 
motion?  The  barrenest  of  all  mortals  is  the  Senti- 


Carlyle  191 

mentalist.  Granting  even  that  he  were  sincere,  and 
did  not  wilfully  deceive  us,  or  without  first  deceiv- 
ing himself,  what  good  is  in  him?  Does  he  not  lie 
there  as  a  perpetual  lesson  of  despair,  and  type  of 
bedrid  valetudinarian  impotence?  His  is  emphat- 
ically a  Virtue  that  has  become,  through  every  fibre, 
conscious  of  itself;  it  is  all  sick,  and  feels  as  if 
it  were  made  of  glass,  and  durst  not  touch  or  be 
touched;  in  the  shape  of  work,  it  can  do  nothing; 
at  the  utmost,  by  incessant  nursing  and  caudling, 
keep  itself  alive.  As  the  last  stage  of  all,  when 
Virtue,  properly  so  called,  has  ceased  to  be  practised, 
and  become  extinct,  and  a  mere  remembrance,  we 
have  the  era  of  Sophists,  descanting  of  its  existence, 
proving  it,  denying  it,  mechanically  "  accounting  " 
for  it;  —  as  dissectors  and  demonstrators  cannot 
operate  till  once  the  body  be  dead. 

Thus  is  true  Moral  genius,  like  true  Intellectual, 
which  indeed  is  but  a  lower  phasis  thereof,  "  ever  a 
secret  to  itself."  The  healthy  moral  nature  loves 
Goodness,  and  without  wonder  wholly  lives  in  it: 
the  unhealthy  makes  love  to  it,  and  would  fain  get 
to  live  in  it;  or,  finding  such  courtship  fruitless, 
turns  round,  and  not  without  contempt  abandons  it. 
These  curious  relations  of  the  Voluntary  and  Con- 
scious to  the  Involuntary  and  Unconscious,  and  the 
small  proportion  which,  in  all  departments  of  our 
life,  the  former  bears  to  the  latter,  —  might  lead 
us  into  deep  questions  of  Psychology  and  Physi- 
ology :  such,  however,  belong  not  to  our  present 
object.  Enough,  if  the  fact  itself  become  apparent, 
that  Nature  so  meant  it  with  us ;  that  in  this  wise 
we  are  made.  We  may  now  say,  that  view  man's 
individual  Existence  under  what  aspect  we  will, 


192  Best  English  Essays 

under  the  highest  spiritual,  as  under  the  merely 
animal  aspect,  everywhere  the  grand  vital  energy, 
while  in  its  sound  state,  is  an  unseen  unconscious 
one ;  or,  in  the  words  of  our  old  Aphorism,  "  the 
healthy  know  not  of  their  health,  but  only  the  sick." 

To  understand  man,  however,  we  must  look  be- 
yond the  individual  man  and  his  actions  or  interests, 
and  view  him  in  combination  with  his  fellows.  It 
is  in  Society  that  man  first  feels  what  he  is ;  first 
becomes  what  he  can  be.  In  Society  an  altogether 
new  set  of  spiritual  activities  are  evolved  in  him, 
and  the  old  immeasurably  quickened  and  strength- 
ened. Society  is  the  genial  element  wherein  his 
nature  first  lives  and  grows ;  the  solitary  man  were 
but  a  small  portion  of  himself,  and  must  continue 
for  ever  folded  in,  stunted  and  only  half  alive. 
"  Already,"  says  a  deep  Thinker,  with  more  mean- 
ing than  will  disclose  itself  at  once,  "  my  opinion, 
my  conviction,  gains  infinitely  in  strength  and  sure- 
ness,  the  moment  a  second  mind  has  adopted  it." 
Such,  even  in  its  simplest  form,  is  association;  so 
wondrous  the  communion  of  soul  with  soul  as  di- 
rected to  the  mere  act  of  Knowing !  In  other  higher 
acts,  the  wonder  is  still  more  manifest ;  as  in  that 
portion  of  our  being  which  we  name  the  Moral: 
for  properly,  indeed,  all  communion  is  of  a  moral 
sort,  whereof  such  intellectual  communion  (in  the 
act  of  knowing)  is  itself  an  example.  But  with 
regard  to  Morals  strictly  so  called,  it  is  in  Society, 
we  might  almost  say,  that  Morality  begins ;  here  at 
least  it  takes  an  altogether  new  form,  and  on  every 
side,  as  in  living  growth,  expands  itself.  The 
Duties  of  Man  to  himself,  to  what  is  Highest  in 


Carlyle  193 

himself,  make  but  the  First  Table  of  the  Law:  to 
the  First  Table  is  now  superadded  a  Second,  with  the 
Duties  of  Man  to  his  Neighbour;  whereby  also 
the  significance  of  the  First  now  assumes  its  true 
importance.  Man  has  joined  himself  with  man; 
soul  acts  and  reacts  on  soul;  a  mystic  miraculous 
unfathomable  Union  establishes  itself;  Life,  in  all 
its  elements,  has  become  intensated,  consecrated. 
The  lightning-spark  of  Thought,  generated,  or  say 
rather  heaven-kindled,  in  the  solitary  mind,  awakens 
its  express  likeness  in  another  mind,  in  a  thousand 
other  minds,  and  all  blaze  up  together  in  combined 
fire ;  reverberated  from  mind  to  mind,  fed  also  with 
fresh  fuel  in  each,  it  acquires  incalculable  new  light 
as  Thought,  incalculable  new  heat  as  converted  into 
Action.  By  and  by,  a  common  store  of  Thought 
can  accumulate,  and  be  transmitted  as  an  ever- 
lasting possession :  Literature,  whether  as  preserved 
in  the  memory  of  Bards,  in  Runes  and  Hieroglyphs 
engraved  on  stone,  or  in  Books  of  written  or  printed 
paper,  comes  into  existence,  and  begins  to  play  its 
wondrous  part.  Polities  are  formed ;  the  weak  sub- 
mitting to  the  strong ;  with  a  willing  loyalty,  giving 
obedience  that  he  may  receive  guidance:  or  say 
rather,  in  honour  of  our  nature,  the  ignorant  sub- 
mitting to  the  wise ;  for  so  it  is  in  all  even  the  rudest 
communities,  man  never  yields  himself  wholly  to 
brute  Force,  but  always  to  moral  Greatness ;  thus 
the  universal  title  of  respect,  from  the  Oriental 
Sheik,  from  the  Sachem  of  the  Red  Indians,  down 
to  our  English  Sir,  implies  only  that  he  whom  we 
mean  to  honour  is  our  senior.  Last,  as  the  crown 
and  all-supporting  keystone  of  the  fabric,  Religion 
arises.  The  devout  meditation  of  the  isolated  man, 

'3 


194  Best  English  Essays 

which  flitted  through  his  soul,  like  a  transient  tone 
of  Love  and  Awe  from  unknown  lands,  acquires 
certainty,  continuance,  when  it  is  shared-in  by  his 
brother  men.  "  Where  two  or  three  are  gathered 
together "  in  the  name  of  the  Highest,  then  first 
does  the  Highest,  as  it  is  written,  "  appear  among 
them  to  bless  them  " ;  then  first  does  an  Altar  and 
act  of  united  Worship  open  a  way  from  Earth  to 
Heaven ;  whereon,  were  it  but  a  simple  Jacob's- 
ladder,  the  heavenly  Messengers  will  travel,  with 
glad  tidings  and  unspeakable  gifts  for  men.  Such 
is  SOCIETY,  the  vital  articulation  of  many  individ- 
uals into  a  new  collective  individual:  greatly  the 
most  important  of  man's  attainments  on  this  earth ; 
that  in  which,  and  by  virtue  of  which,  all  his  other 
attainments  and  attempts  find  their  arena,  and. have 
their  value.  Considered  well,  Society  is  the  stand- 
ing wonder  of  our  existence;  a  true  region  of  the 
Supernatural ;  as  it  were,  a  second  all-embracing 
Life,  wherein  our  first  individual  Life  becomes 
doubly  and  trebly  alive,  and  whatever  of  Infinitude 
was  in  us  bodies  itself  forth,  and  becomes  visible 
and  active. 

To  figure  Society  as  endowed  with  life  is  scarcely 
a  metaphor;  but  rather  the  statement  of  a  fact  by 
such  imperfect  methods  as  language  affords.  Look 
at  it  closely,  that  mystic  Union,  Nature's  highest 
work  with  man,  wherein  man's  volition  plays  an 
indispensable  yet  so  subordinate  a  part,  and  the 
small  Mechanical  grows  so  mysteriously  and  indis- 
solubly  out  of  the  infinite  Dynamical,  like  Body  out 
of  Spirit,  —  is  truly  enough  vital,  what  we  can  call 
vital,  and  bears  the  distinguishing  character  of  life. 
In  the  same  style  also,  we  can  say  that  Society  has 


Carlyle  195 

its  period  of  sickness  and  vigour,  of  youth,  man- 
hood, decrepitude,  dissolution  and  new  birth ;  in 
one  or  other  of  which  stages  we  may,  in  all  times, 
and  all  places  where  men  inhabit,  discern  it;  and 
do  ourselves,  in  this  time  and  place,  whether  as 
cooperating  or  as  contending,  as  healthy  members 
or  as  diseased  ones,  to  our  joy  and  sorrow,  form 
part  of  it.  The  question,  What  is  the  actual  condi- 
tion of  Society  ?  has  in  these  days  unhappily  become 
important  enough.  No  one  of  us  is  unconcerned  in 
that  question ;  but  for  the  majority  of  thinking  men 
a  true  answer  to  it,  such  is  the  state  of  matters, 
appears  almost  as  the  one  thing  needful.  Mean- 
while, as  the  true  answer,  that  is  to  say,  the  complete 
and  fundamental  answer  and  settlement,  often  as  it 
has  been  demanded,  is  nowhere  forthcoming,  and 
indeed  by  its  nature  is  impossible,  any  honest  ap- 
proximation towards  such  is  not  without  value. 
The  feeblest  light,  or  even  so  much  as  a  more  pre- 
cise recognition  of  the  darkness,  which  is  the  first 
step  to  attainment  of  light,  will  be  welcome. 

This  once  understood,  let  it  not  seem  idle  if  we 
remark  that  here  too  our  old  Aphorism  holds ;  that 
again  in  the  Body  Politic,  as  in  the  animal  body, 
the  sign  of  right  performance  is  Unconsciousness. 
Such  indeed  is  virtually  the  meaning  of  that  phrase, 
"  artificial  state  of  society,"  as  contrasted  with  the 
natural  state,  and  indicating  something  so  inferior 
to  it.  For,  in  all  vital  things,  men  distinguish  an 
Artificial  and  a  Natural;  founding  on  some  dim 
perception  or  sentiment  of  the  very  truth  we  here 
insist  on  :  the  artificial  is  the  conscious,  mechanical ; 
the  natural  is  the  unconscious,  dynamical.  Thus, 
as  we  have  an  artificial  Poetry,  and  prize  only  the 


196  Best  English  Essays 

natural ;  so  likewise  we  have  an  artificial  Morality, 
an  artificial  Wisdom,  an  artificial  Society.  The 
artificial  Society  is  precisely  one  that  knows  its 
own  structure,  its  own  internal  functions;  not  in 
watching,  not  in  knowing  which,  but  in  working 
outwardly  to  the  fulfilment  of  its  aim,  does  the  well- 
being  of  a  Society  consist.  Every  Society,  every 
Polity,  has  a  spiritual  principle ;  is  the  embodiment, 
tentative  and  more  or  less  complete,  of  an  Idea: 
all  its  tendencies  of  endeavour,  specialties  of  custom, 
its  laws,  politics  and  whole  procedure  (as  the  glance 
of  some  Montesquieu,  across  innumerable  super- 
ficial entanglements,  can  partly  decipher),  are  pre- 
scribed by  an  Idea,  and  flow  naturally  from  it,  as 
movements  from  the  living  source  of  motion.  This 
Idea,  be  it  of  devotion  to  a  man  or  class  of  men,  to 
a  creed,  to  an  institution,  or  even,  as  in  more  ancient 
times,  to  a  piece  of  land,  is  ever  a  true  Loyalty; 
has  in  it  something  of  a  religious,  paramount,  quite 
infinite  character;  it  is  properly  the  Soul  of  the 
State,  its  Life;  mysterious  as  other  forms  of  Life, 
and  like  these  working  secretly,  and  in  a  depth 
beyond  that  of  consciousness. 

Accordingly,  it  is  not  in  the  vigorous  ages  of 
a  Roman  Republic  that  Treatises  of  the  Common- 
wealth are  written :  while  the  Decii  are  rushing  with 
devoted  bodies  on  the  enemies  of  Rome,  what  need 
of  preaching  Patriotism?  The  virtue  of  Patriotism 
has  already  sunk  from  its  pristine  all-transcendent 
condition,  before  it  has  received  a  name.  So  long 
as  the  Commonwealth  continues  rightly  athletic, 
it  cares  not  to  dabble  in  anatomy.  Why  teach 
obedience  to  the  Sovereign ;  why  so  much  as  ad- 
mire it,  or  separately  recognise  it,  while  a  divine 


Carlyle  197 

idea  of  Obedience  perennially  inspires  all  men? 
Loyalty,  like  Patriotism,  of  which  it  is  a  form,  was 
not  praised  till  it  had  begun  to  decline;  the  Preux 
Chevaliers  first  became  rightly  admirable,  when 
"  dying  for  their  king  "  had  ceased  to  be  a  habit 
with  chevaliers.  For  if  the  mystic  significance  of 
the  State,  let  this  be  what  it  may,  dwells  vitally  in 
every  heart,  encircles  every  life  as  with  a  second 
higher  life,  how  should  it  stand  self-questioning? 
It  must  rush  outward,  and  express  itself  by  works. 
Besides,  if  perfect,  it  is  there  as  by  necessity,  and 
does  not  excite  inquiry :  it  is  also  by  nature  infinite, 
has  no  limits ;  therefore  can  be  circumscribed  by  no 
conditions  and  definitions ;  cannot  be  reasoned  of ; 
except  musically,  or  in  the  language  of  Poetry, 
cannot  yet  so  much  as  be  spoken  of. 

In  those  days,  Society  was  what  we  name  healthy, 
sound  at  heart.  Not  indeed  without  suffering 
enough  ;  not  without  perplexities,  difficulty  on  every 
side:  for  such  is  the  appointment  of  man;  his 
highest  and  sole  blessedness  is,  that  he  toil,  and 
know  what  to  toil  at :  not  in  ease,  but  in  united  vic- 
torious labour,  which  is  at  once  evil  and  the  victory 
over  evil,  does  his  Freedom  lie.  Nay  often,  looking 
no  deeper  than  such  superficial  perplexities  of  the 
early  Time,  historians  have  taught  us  that  it  was 
all  one  mass  of  contradiction  and  disease;  and  in 
the  antique  Republic  or  feudal  Monarchy  have  seen 
only  the  confused  chaotic  quarry,  not  the  robust 
labourer,  or  the  stately  edifice  he  was  building  of  it. 

If  Society,  in  such  ages,  had  its  difficulty,  it  had 
also  its  strength;  if  sorrowful  masses  of  rubbish 
so  encumbered  it,  the  tough  sinews  to  hurl  them 
aside,  with  indomitable  heart,  were  not  wanting. 


198  Best  English  Essays 

Society  went  along  without  complaint;  did  not 
stop  to  scrutinise  itself,  to  say,  How  well  I  perform ! 
or,  Alas,  how  ill !  Men  did  not  yet  feel  themselves 
to  be  "  the  envy  of  surrounding  nations  "  ;  and  were 
enviable  on  that  very  account.  Society  was  what 
we  can  call  whole,  in  both  senses  of  the  word.  The 
individual  man  was  in  himself  a  whole,  or  com- 
plete union;  and  could  combine  with  his  fellows 
as  the  living  member  of  a  greater  whole.  For  all 
men,  through  their  life,  were  animated  by  one  great 
Idea;  thus  all  efforts  pointed  one  way,  everywhere 
there  was  zvholeness.  Opinion  and  Action  had  not 
yet  become  disunited;  but  the  former  could  still 
produce  the  latter,  or  attempt  to  produce  it ;  as  the 
stamp  does  its  impression  while  the  wax  is  not 
hardened.  Thought  and  the  voice  of  thought  were 
also  a  unison ;  thus,  instead  of  Speculation,  we  had 
Poetry ;  Literature,  in  its  rude  utterance,  was  as 
yet  a  heroic  Song,  perhaps  too  a  devotional  Anthem. 
Religion  was  everywhere;  Philosophy  lay  hid 
under  it,  peaceably  included  in  it.  Herein,  as  in 
the  life-centre  of  all,  lay  the  true  health  and  one- 
ness. Only  at  a  later  era  must  Religion  split  itself 
into  Philosophies ;  and  thereby,  the  vital  union  of 
Thought  being  lost,  disunion  and  mutual  collision 
in  all  provinces  of  Speech  and  Action  more  and 
more  prevail.  For  if  the  Poet,  or  Priest,  or  by 
whatever  title  the  inspired  thinker  may  be  named, 
is  the  sign  of  vigour  and  well-being;  so  likewise  is 
the  Logician,  or  uninspired  thinker,  the  sign  of 
disease,  probably  of  decrepitude  and  decay.  Thus, 
not  to  mention  other  instances,  one  of  them  much 
nearer-hand,  —  so  soon  as  Prophecy  among  the 
Hebrews  had  ceased,  then  did  the  reign  of  Argu- 


Carlyle  199 

mentation  begin ;  and  the  ancient  Theocracy,  in  its 
Sadduceeisms  and  Phariseeisms,  and  vain  jangling 
of  sects  and  doctors,  give  token  that  the  soul  of  it 
had  fled,  and  that  the  body  itself,  by  natural  dis- 
solution, "  with  the  old  forces  still  at  work,  but 
working  in  reverse  order,"  was  on  the  road  to  final 
disappearance. 

We  might  pursue  this  question  into  innumerable 
other  ramifications ;  and  everywhere,  under  new 
shapes,  find  the  same  truth,  which  we  here  so  im- 
perfectly enunciate,  disclosed;  that  throughout  the 
whole  world  of  man,  in  all  manifestations  and  per- 
formances of  his  nature,  outward  and  inward,  per- 
sonal and  social,  the  Perfect,  the  Great  is  a  mystery 
to  itself,  knows  not  itself;  whatsoever  does  know 
itself  is  already  little,  and  more  or  less  imperfect. 
Or  otherwise,  we  may  say,  Unconsciousness  belongs 
to  pure  unmixed  life;  Consciousness  to  a  diseased 
mixture  and  conflict  of  life  and  death:  Uncon- 
sciousness is  the  sign  of  creation ;  Consciousness, 
at  best,  that  of  manufacture.  So  deep,  in  this  exist- 
ence of  ours,  is  the  significance  of  Mystery.  Well 
might  the  Ancients  make  Silence  a  god ;  for  it  is 
the  element  of  all  godhood,  infinitude,  or  transcen- 
dental greatness ;  at  once  the  source  and  the  ocean 
wherein  all  such  begins  and  ends.  In  the  same 
sense,  too,  have  Poets  sung  "  Hymns  to  the  Night  "  ; 
as  if  Night  were  nobler  than  Day ;  as  if  Day 
were  but  a  small  motley-coloured  veil  spread  tran- 
siently over  the  infinite  bosom  of  Night,  and  did 
but  deform  and  hide  from  us  its  purely  transparent 
eternal  deeps.  So  likewise  have  they  spoken  and 
sung  as  if  Silence  were  the  grand  epitome  and  com- 


loo  Best  English  Essays 

plete  sum-total  of  all  Harmony;  and  Death,  what 
mortals  call  Death,  properly  the  beginning  of  Life. 
Under  such  figures,  since  except  in  figures  there  is 
no  speaking  of  the  Invisible,  have  men  endeavoured 
to  express  a  great  Truth ;  —  a  Truth,  in  our  Times, 
as  nearly  as  is  perhaps  possible,  forgotten  by  the 
most ;  which  nevertheless  continues  forever  true, 
forever  all-important,  and  will  one  day,  under  new 
figures,  be  again  brought  home  to  the  bosoms  of  all. 
But  indeed,  in  a  far  lower  sense,  the  rudest  mind 
has  still  some  intimation  of  the  greatness  there  is 
in  Mystery.  If  Silence  was  made  a  god  of  by 
the  Ancients,  he  still  continues  a  government-clerk 
among  us  Moderns.  To  all  quacks,  moreover,  of 
what  sort  soever,  the  effect  of  Mystery  is  v/ell 
known :  here  and  there  some  Cagliostro,  even  in 
latter  days,  turns  it  to  notable  account:  the  block- 
head also,  who  is  ambitioas,  and  has  no  talent,  finds 
sometimes  in  "  the  talent  of  silence,"  a  kind  of  suc- 
cedaneum.  Or  again,  looking  on  the  opposite  side 
of  the  matter,  do  we  not  see,  in  the  common  under- 
standing of  mankind,  a  certain  distrust,  a  certain 
contempt  of  what  is  altogether  self-conscious  and 
mechanical  ?  As  nothing  that  is  wholly  seen  through 
has  other  than  a  trivial  character ;  so  anything  pro- 
fessing to  be  great,  and  yet  wholly  to  see  through 
itself,  is  already  known  to  be  false,  and  a  failure. 
The  evil  repute  your  "  theoretical  men  "  stand  in, 
the  acknowledged  inefficiency  of  "  paper  consti- 
tutions," and  all  that  class  of  objects,  are  instances 
of  this.  Experience  often  repeated,  and  perhaps 
a  certain  instinct  of  something  far  deeper  that  lies 
under  such  experiences,  has  taught  men  so  much. 
They  know  beforehand,  that  the  loud  is  generally 


Carlyle  201 

the  insignificant,  the  empty.  Whatsoever  can  pro- 
claim itself  from  the  house-tops  may  be  fit  for  the 
hawker,  and  for  those  multitudes  that  must  needs 
buy  of  him;  but  for  any  deeper  use,  might-  as 
well  continue  unproclaimed.  Observe  too,  how  the 
converse  of  the  proposition  holds;  how  the  insig- 
nificant, the  empty,  is  usually  the  loud;  and,  after 
the  manner  of  a  drum,  is  loud  even  because  of  its 
emptiness.  The  uses  of  some  Patent  Dinner  Cale- 
factor  can  be  bruited  abroad  over  the  whole  world 
in  the  course  of  the  first  winter ;  those  of  the  Print- 
ing Press  are  not  so  well  seen  into  for  the  first  three 
centuries:  the  passing  of  the  Select- Vestries  Bill 
raises  more  noise  and  hopeful  expectancy  among 
mankind  than  did  the  promulgation  of  the  Christian 
Religion.  Again,  and  again,  we  say,  the  great,  the 
creative  and  enduring  is  ever  a  secret  to  itself ;  only 
the  small,  the  barren  and  transient  is  otherwise. 

If  we  now,  with  a  practical  medical  view,  exam- 
ine, by  this  same  test  of  Unconsciousness,  the  Con- 
dition of  our  own  Era,  and  of  man's  Life  therein, 
the  diagnosis  we  arrive  at  is  nowise  of  a  flattering 
sort.  The  state  of  Society  in  our  days  is,  of  all 
possible  states,  the  least  an  unconscious  one:  this 
is  specially  the  Era  when  all  manner  of  Inquiries 
into  what  was  once  the  unfelt,  involuntary  sphere 
of  man's  existence,  find  their  place,  and,  as  it  were, 
occupy  the  whole  domain  of  thought.  What,  for 
example,  is  all  this  that  we  hear,  for  the  last  gen- 
eration or  two,  about  the  Improvement  of  the  Age, 
the  Spirit  of  the  Age,  Destruction  of  Prejudice, 
Progress  of  the  Species,  and  the  March  of  Intellect, 
but  an  unhealthy  state  of  self-sentience,  self-survey ; 


2O2  Best  English  Essays 

the  precursor  and  prognostic  of  still  worse  health? 
That  Intellect  do  march,  if  possible  at  double-quick 
time,  is  very  desirable;  nevertheless,  why  should 
she  turn  round  at  every  stride,  and  cry:  See  you 
what  a  stride  I  have  taken!  Such  a  marching  of 
Intellect  is  distinctly  of  the  spavined  kind ;  what  the 
Jockeys  call  "  all  action  and  no  go."  Or  at  best,  if 
we  examine  well,  it  is  the  marching  of  that  gouty 
Patient,  whom  his  Doctors  had  clapt  on  a  metal  floor 
artificially  heated  to  the  searing  point,  so  that  he  was 
obliged  to  march,  and  did  march  with  a  vengeance 
—  nowhither.  Intellect  did  not  awaken  for  the  first 
time  yesterday;  but  has  been  under  way  from 
Noah's  Flood  downwards :  greatly  her  best  prog- 
ress, moreover,  was  in  the  old  times,  when  she  said 
nothing  about  it.  In  those  same  "  dark  ages,"  Intel- 
lect (metaphorically  as  well  as  literally)  could  in- 
vent glass,  which  now  she  has  enough  ado  to  grind 
into  spectacles.  Intellect  built  not  only  Churches, 
but  a  Church,  the  Church,  based  on  this  firm  Earth, 
yet  reaching  up,  and  leading  up,  as  high  as  Heaven ; 
and  now  it  is  all  she  can  do  to  keep  its  doors  bolted, 
that  there  be  no  tearing  of  the  Surplices,  no  robbery 
of  the  Alms-box.  She  built  a  Senate-house  likewise, 
glorious  in  its  kind;  and  now  it  costs  her  a  well- 
nigh  mortal  effort  to  sweep  it  clear  of  vermin,  and 
get  the  roof  made  rain-tight. 

But  the  truth  is,  with  Intellect,  as  with  most  other 
things,  we  are  now  passing  from  that  first  or  boast- 
ful stage  of  Self-sentience  into  the  second  or  painful 
one :  out  of  these  often-asseverated  declarations  that 
"  our  system  is  in  high  order,"  we  come  now,  by 
natural  sequence,  to  the  melancholy  conviction  that 
it  is  altogether  the  reverse.  Thus,  for  instance, 


Carlyle  203 

in  the  matter  of  Government,  the  period  of  the 
"  Invaluable  Constitution  "  has  to  be  followed  by  a 
Reform  Bill ;  to  laudatory  De  Lolmes  succeed  ob- 
jurgatory Benthams.  At  any  rate,  what  Treatises 
on  the  Social  Contract,  on  the  Elective  Franchise, 
the  Rights  of  Man,  the  Rights  of  Property,  Codi- 
fications, Institutions,  Constitutions,  have  we  not, 
for  long  years,  groaned  under!  Or  again,  with 
a  wider  survey,  consider  those  Essays  on  Man, 
Thoughts  on  Man,  Inquiries  concerning  Man ;  not 
to  mention  Evidences  of  the  Christian  Faith, 
Theories  of  Poetry,  Considerations  on  the  Origin 
of  Evil,  which  during  the  last  century  have  accumu- 
lated on  us  to  a  frightful  extent.  Never  since  the 
beginning  of  Time  was  there,  that  we  hear  or  read 
of,  so  intensely  self-conscious  a  Society.  Our  whole 
relations  to  the  Universe  and  to  our  fellow-man 
have  become  an  Inquiry,  a  Doubt;  nothing  will 
go  on  of  its  own  accord,  and  do  its  function  quietly ; 
but  all  things  must  be  probed  into,  the  whole  work- 
ing of  man's  world  be  anatomically  studied.  Alas, 
anatomically  studied,  that  it  may  be  medically  aided ! 
Till  at  length  indeed,  we  have  come  to  such  a  pass, 
that  except  in  this  same  medicine,  with  its  artifices 
and  appliances,  few  can  so  much  as  imagine  any 
strength  or  hope  to  remain  for  us.  The  whole  Life 
of  Society  must  now  be  carried  on  by  drugs :  doctor 
after  doctor  appears  with  his  nostrum,  of  Cooper- 
ative Societies,  Universal  Suffrage,  Cottage-and- 
cow  systems,  Repression  of  Population,  Vote  by 
Ballot.  To  such  height  has  the  dyspepsia  of  Society 
reached;  as  indeed  the  constant  grinding  internal 
pain,  or  from  time  to  time  the  mad  spasmodic  throes, 
of  all  Society  do  otherwise  too  mournfully  indicate. 


2O4  Best  English  Essays 

Far  be  it  from  us  to  attribute,  as  some  unwise 
persons  do,  the  disease  itself  to  this  unhappy  sen- 
sation that  there  is  a  disease!  The  Encyclopedists 
did  not  produce  the  troubles*  of  France;  but  the 
troubles  of  France  produced  the  Encyclopedists, 
and  much  else.  The  Self-consciousness  is  the  symp- 
tom merely ;  nay,  it  is  also  the  attempt  towards  cure. 
We  record  the  fact,  without  special  censure;  not 
wondering  that  Society  should  feel  itself,  and  in  all 
ways  complain  of  aches  and  twinges,  for  it  has 
suffered  enough.  Napoleon  was  but  a  Job's-com- 
forter,  when  he  told  his  wounded  Staff-officer,  twice 
unhorsed  by  cannon-balls,  and  with  half  his  limbs 
blown  to  pieces :  "  Vous  vous  ecoutez  trop ! " 

On  the  outward,  as  it  were  Physical  diseases  of 
Society,  it  were  beside  our  purpose  to  insist  here. 
These  are  diseases  which  he  who  runs  may  read; 
and  sorrow  over,  with  or  without  hope.  Wealth 
has  accumulated  itself  into  masses ;  and  Poverty, 
also  in  accumulation  enough,  lies  impassably  sep- 
arated from  it;  opposed,  uncommunicating,  like 
forces  in  positive  and  negative  poles.  The  gods 
of  this  lower  world  sit  aloft  on  glittering  thrones, 
less  happy  than  Epicurus's  gods,  but  as  indolent, 
as  impotent ;  while  the  boundless  living  chaos  of 
Ignorance  and  Hunger  welters  terrific,  in  its  dark 
fury,  under  their  feet.  How  much  among  us  might 
be  likened  to  a  whited  sepulchre ;  outwardly  all 
pomp  and  strength ;  but  inwardly  full  of  horror  and 
despair  and  dead-men's  bones!  Iron  highways, 
with  their  wains  fire-winged,  are  uniting  all  ends  of 
the  firm  Land;  quays  and  moles,  with  their  innu- 
merable stately  fleets,  tame  the  Ocean  into  our  pliant 
bearer  of  burdens ;  Labour's  thousand  arms,  of  sinew 


Carlyle  205 

and  of  metal,  all-conquering  everywhere,  from  the 
tops  of  the  mountain  down  to  the  depths  of  the  mine 
and  the  caverns  of  the  sea,  ply  unweariedly  for  the 
service  of  man  :  yet  man  remains  unserved.  He  has 
subdued  this  Planet,  his  habitation  and  inheritance ; 
yet  reaps  no  profit  from  the  victory. 

Sad  to  look  upon :  in  the  highest  stage  of  civili- 
sation, nine  tenths  of  mankind  have  to  struggle  in 
the  lowest  battle  of  savage  or  even  animal  man,  the 
battle  against  Famine.  Countries  are  rich,  pros- 
perous in  all  manner  of  increase,  beyond  example: 
but  the  Men  of  those  countries  are  poor,  needier 
than  ever  of  all  sustenance  outward  and  inward; 
of  Belief,  of  Knowledge,  of  Money,  of  Food.  The 
rule,  Sic  vos  non  vobis,  never  altogether  to  be  got 
rid  of  in  men's  Industry,  now  presses  with  such 
incubus  weight,  that  Industry  must  shake  it  off,  or 
utterly  be  strangled  under  it;  and,  alas,  can  as 
yet  but  gasp  and  rave,  and  aimlessly  struggle,  like 
one  in  the  final  deliration.  Thus  Change,  or  the 
inevitable  approach  of  Change,  is  manifest  every- 
where. In  one  Country  we  have  seen  lava-torrents 
of  fever-frenzy  envelop  all  things ;  Government 
succeed  Government,  like  the  phantasms  of  a  dying 
brain.  In  another  Country,  we  can  even  now  see, 
in  maddest  alternation,  the  Peasant  governed  by  such 
guidance  as  this :  To  labour  earnestly  one  month  in 
raising  wheat,  and  the  next  month  labour  earnestly 
in  burning  it.  So  that  Society,  were  it  not  by  nature 
immortal,  and  its  death  ever  a  new-birth,  might 
appear,  as  it  does  in  the  eyes  of  some,  to  be  sick  to 
dissolution,  and  even  now  writhing  in  its  last  agony. 
Sick  enough  we  must  admit  it  to  be,  with  disease 
enough,  a  whole  nosology  of  diseases;  wherein  he 


206  Best  English  Essays 

perhaps  is  happiest  that  is  not  called  to  prescribe 
as  physician ;  —  wherein,  however,  one  small  piece 
of  policy,  that  of  summoning  the  Wisest  in  the 
Commonwealth,  by  the  sole  method  yet  known  or 
thought  of,  to  come  together  and  with  their  whole 
soul  consult  for  it,  might,  but  for  late  tedious  ex- 
periences, have  seemed  unquestionable  enough. 

But  leaving  this,  let  us  rather  look  within,  into 
the  Spiritual  condition  of  Society,  and  see  what 
aspects  and  prospects  offer  themselves  there.  For 
after  all,  it  is  there  properly  that  the  secret  and 
origin  of  the  whole  is  to  be  sought:  the  Physical 
derangements  of  Society  are  but  the  image  and 
impress  of  its  Spiritual;  while  the  heart  continues 
sound,  all  other  sickness  is  superficial,  and  tem- 
porary. False  Action  is  the  fruit  of  false  Specu- 
lation; let  the  spirit  of  Society  be  free  and  strong, 
that  is  to  say,  let  true  Principles  inspire  the  members 
of  Society,  then  neither  can  disorders  accumulate 
in  its  Practice;  each  disorder  will  be  promptly, 
faithfully  inquired  into,  and  remedied  as  it  arises. 
But  alas,  with  us  the  Spiritual  condition  of  Soci- 
ety is  no  less  sickly  than  the  Physical.  Examine 
man's  internal  world,  in  any  of  its  social  relations 
and  performances,  here  too  all  seems  diseased  self- 
consciousness,  collision  and  mutually-destructive 
struggle.  Nothing  acts  from  within  outwards  in 
undivided  healthy  force ;  everything  lies  impotent, 
lamed,  its  force  turned  inwards,  and  painfully 
"  listens  to  itself." 

To  begin  with  our  highest  Spiritual  function, 
with  Religion,  we  might  ask,  Whither  has  Religion 
now  fled?  Of  Churches  and  their  establishments 
we  here  say  nothing;  nor  of  the  unhappy  domains 


Carlyle  207 

of  Unbelief,  and  how  innumerable  men,  blinded 
in  their  minds,  have  grown  to  "  live  without  God 
in  the  world  " ;  but,  taking  the  fairest  side  of  the 
matter,  we  ask,  What  is  the  nature  of  that  same 
Religion,  which  still  lingers  in  the  hearts  of  the 
few  who  are  called,  and  call  themselves,  specially 
the  Religious?  Is  it  a  healthy  religion,  vital,  un- 
conscious of  itself ;  that  shines  forth  spontaneously 
in  doing  of  the  Work,  or  even  in  preaching  of  the 
Word?  Unhappily,  no.  Instead  of  heroic  martyr 
Conduct,  and  inspired  and  soul-inspiring  Eloquence, 
whereby  Religion  itself  were  brought  home  to  our 
living  bosoms,  to  live  and  reign  there,  we  have 
"  Discourses  on  the  Evidences,"  endeavouring,  with 
smallest  result,  to  make  it  probable  that  such  a 
thing  as  Religion  exists.  The  most  enthusiastic 
Evangelicals  do  not  preach  a  Gospel,  but  keep 
describing  how  it  should  and  might  be  preached: 
to  awaken  the  sacred  fire  of  faith,  as  by  a  sacred 
contagion,  is  not  their  endeavour;  but,  at  most,  to 
describe  how  Faith  shows  and  acts,  and  scientifically 
distinguish  true  Faith  from  false.  Religion,  like 
all  else,  is  conscious  of  itself,  listens  to  itself;  it  be- 
comes less  and  less  creative,  vital ;  more  and  more 
mechanical.  Considered  as  a  whole,  the  Christian 
Religion  of  late  ages  has  been  continually  dissi- 
pating itself  into  Metaphysics;  and  threatens  now 
to  disappear,  as  some  rivers  do,  in  deserts  of  barren 
sand. 

Of  Literature,  and  its  deep-seated,  wide-spread 
maladies,  why  speak  ?  Literature  is  but  a  branch  of 
Religion,  and  always  participates  in  its  character: 
however,  in  our  time,  it  is  the  only  branch  that  still 
shows  any  greenness ;  and,  as  some  think,  must  one 


2o8  Best  English  Essays 

day  become  the  main  stem.  Now,  apart  from  the 
subterranean  and  tartarean  regions  of  Literature; 
—  leaving  out  of  view  the  frightful,  scandalous 
statistics  of  Puffing,  the  mystery  of  Slander,  False- 
hood, Hatred  and  other  convulsion-work  of  rabid 
Imbecility,  and  all  that  has  rendered  Literature  on 
that  side  a  perfect  "  Babylon  the  mother  of  Abomi- 
nations," in  very  deed  making  the  world  "  drunk  " 
with  the  wine  of  -her  iniquity ;  —  forgetting  all 
this,  let  us  look  only  to  the  regions  of  the  upper 
air;  to  such  Literature  as  can  be  said  to  have  some 
attempt  towards  truth  in  it,  some  tone  of  music, 
and  if  it  be  not  poetical,  to  hold  of  the  poetical. 
Among  other  characteristics,  is  not  this  manifest 
enough :  that  it  knows  itself  ?  Spontaneous  de- 
votedness  to  the  object,  being  wholly  possessed 
by  the  object,  what  we  can  call  Inspiration,  has 
well-nigh  ceased  to  appear  in  Literature.  Which 
melodious  Singer  forgets  that  he  is  singing  melo- 
diously? We  have  not  the  love  of  greatness,  but 
the  love  of  the  love  of  greatness.  Hence  infinite 
Affectations,  Distractions;  in  every  case  inevitable 
Error.  Consider,  for  one  example,  this  peculiarity 
of  Modern  Literature,  the  sin  that  has  been  named 
View-hunting.  In  our  elder  writers,  there  are  no 
paintings  of  scenery  for  its  own  sake ;  no  euphuistic 
gallantries  with  Nature,  but  a  constant  heartlove  for 
her,  a  constant  dwelling  in  communion  with  her. 
View-hunting,  with  so  much  else  that  is  of  kin  to 
it,  first  came  decisively  into  action  through  the 
"  Sorrows  of  Werter  " ;  which  wonderful  Perform- 
ance, indeed,  may  in  many  senses  be  regarded  as  the 
progenitor  of  all  that  has  since  become  popular  in 
Literature;  whereof,  in  so  far  as  concerns  spirit 


Carlyle  209 

and  tendency,  it  still  offers  the  most  instructive 
image;  for  nowhere,  except  in  its  own  country, 
above  all  in  the  mind  of  its  illustrious  Author,  has 
it  yet  fallen  wholly  obsolete.  Scarcely  ever,  till 
that  late  epoch,  did  any  worshipper  of  Nature 
become  entirely  aware  that  he  was  worshipping, 
much  to  his  own  credit ;  and  think  of  saying  to 
himself:  Come,  let  us  make  a  description!  Intol- 
erable enough :  when  every  puny  whipster  plucks 
out  his  pencil,  and  insists  on  painting  you  a  scene; 
so  that  the  instant  you  discern  such  a  thing  as 
"  wavy  outline,"  "  mirror  of  the  lake,"  "  stern  head- 
land," or  the  like,  in  any  Book,  you  tremulously 
hasten  on ;  and  scarcely  the  Author  of  Waverley 
himself  can  tempt  you  not  to  skip. 

Nay,  is  not  the  diseased  self-conscious  state  of 
Literature  disclosed  in  this  one  fact,  which  lies  so 
near  us  here,  the  prevalence  of  Reviewing !  Sterne's 
wish  for  a  reader  "  that  would  give-up  the  reins  of 
his  imagination  into  his  author's  hands,  and  be 
pleased  he  knew  not  why,  and  cared  not  wherefore," 
might  lead  him  a  long  journey  now.  Indeed,  for 
our  best  class  of  readers,  the  chief  pleasure,  a  very 
stinted  one,  is  this  same  knowing  of  the  Why; 
which  many  a  Kames  and  Bossu  has  been,  ineffect- 
ually enough,  endeavouring  to  teach  us :  till  at  last 
these  also  have  laid  down  their  trade;  and  now 
your  Reviewer  is  a  mere  taster;  who  tastes,  and 
says,  by  the  evidence  of  such  palate,  such  tongue, 
as  he  has  got,  It  is  good,  It  is  bad.  Was  it  thus 
that  the  French  carried  out  certain  inferior  creatures 
on  their  Algerine  Expedition,  to  taste  the  wells  for 
them,  and  try  whether  they  were  poisoned?  Far 
be  it  from  us  to  disparage  our  own  craft,  whereby 

14 


2io  Best  English  Essays 

we  have  our  living-!  Only  we  must  note  these 
things:  that  Reviewing  spreads  with  strange 
vigour;  that  such  a  man  as  Byron  reckons  the  Re- 
viewer and  the  Poet  equal ;  that  at  the  last  Leipzig 
Fair,  there  was  advertised  a  Review  of  Reviews. 
By  and  by  it  will  be  found  that  all  Literature  has 
become  one  boundless  self-devouring  Review ;  and, 
as  in  London  routs,  we  have  to  do  nothing,  but  only 
to  see  others  do  nothing.  —  Thus  does  Literature 
also,  like  a  sick  thing,  superabundantly  "  listen  to 
itself." 

No  less  is  this  unhealthy  symptom  manifest,  if 
we  cast  a  glance  on  our  Philosophy,  on  the  character 
of  our  speculative  Thinking.  Nay  already,  as  above 
hinted,  the  mere  existence  and  necessity  of  a  Phi- 
losophy is  an  evil.  Man  is  sent  hither  not  to  ques- 
tion, but  to  work :  "  the  end  of  man,"  it  was  long 
ago  written,  "  is  an  Action,  not  a  Thought."  In 
the  perfect  state,  all  Thought  were  but  the  picture 
and  inspiring  symbol  of  Action ;  Philosophy,  except 
as  Poetry  and  Religion,  would  have  no  being.  And 
yet  how,  in  this  imperfect  state,  can  it  be  avoided, 
can  it  be  dispensed  with?  Man  stands  as  in  the 
centre  of  Nature ;  his  fraction  of  Time  encircled 
by  Eternity,  his  handbreadth  of  Space  encircled  by 
Infinitude :  how  shall  he  forbear  asking  himself, 
What  am  I ;  and  Whence ;  and  Whither  ?  How 
too,  except  in  slight  partial  hints,  in  kind  assever- 
ations and  assurances,  such  as  a  mother  quiets  her 
fretfully  inquisitive  child  with,  shall  he  get  answer 
to  such  inquiries? 

The  disease  of  Metaphysics,  accordingly,  is  a 
perennial  one.  In  all  ages,  those  questions  of  Death 
and  Immortality,  Origin  of  Evil,  Freedom  and 


Carlyle  211 

Necessity,  must,  under  new  forms,  anew  make  their 
appearance;  ever,  from  time  to  time,  must  the 
attempt  to  shape  for  ourselves  some  Theorem  of 
the  Universe  be  repeated.  And  ever  unsuccessfully : 
for  what  Theorem  of  the  Infinite  can  the  Finite 
render  complete?  We,  the  whole  species  of  Man- 
kind, and  our  whole  existence  and  history,  are  but 
a  floating  speck  in  the  illimitable  ocean  of  the  All; 
yet  in  that  ocean;  indissoluble  portion  thereof; 
partaking  of  its  infinite  tendencies :  borne  this  way 
and  that  by  its  deep-swelling  tides,  and  grand  ocean 
currents ;  —  of  which  what  faintest  chance  is  there 
that  we  should  ever  exhaust  the  significance,  ascer- 
tain the  goings  and  comings?  A  region  of  Doubt, 
therefore,  hovers  for  ever  in  the  background;  in 
Action  alone  can  we  have  certainty.  Nay  properly 
Doubt  is  the  indispensable  inexhaustible  material 
whereon  Action  works,  which  Action  has  to  fashion 
into  Certainty  and  Reality ;  only  on  a  canvas  of 
Darkness,  such  is  man's  way  of  being,  could  the 
many-colored  picture  of  our  Life  paint  itself  and 
shine. 

Thus  if  our  eldest  system  of  Metaphysics  is  as 
old  as  the  "  Book  of  Genesis,"  our  latest  is  that  of 
Mr.  Thomas  Hope,  published  only  within  the  cur- 
rent year.  It  is  a  chronic  malady  that  of  Meta- 
physics, as  we  said,  and  perpetually  recurs  on  us. 
At  the  utmost,  there  is  a  better  and  a  worse  in  it; 
a  stage  of  convalescence,  and  a  stage  of  relapse  with 
new  sickness :  these  for  ever  succeed  each  other, 
as  is  the  nature  of  all  Life-movement  here  below. 
The  first,  or  convalescent  stage,  we  might  also  name 
that  of  Dogmatical  or  Constructive  Metaphysics; 
when  the  mind  constructively  endeavours  to  scheme 


212  Best  English  Essays 

out  and  assert  for  itself  an  actual  Theorem  of  the 
Universe,  and  therewith  for  a  time  rests  satisfied. 
The  second  or  sick  stage  might  be  called  that  of 
Skeptical  or  Inquisitory  Metaphysics ;  when  the 
mind  having  widened  its  sphere  of  vision,  the  exist- 
ing Theorem  of  the  Universe  no  longer  answers  the 
phenomena,  no  longer  yields  contentment ;  but  must 
be  torn  in  pieces,  and  certainty  anew  sought  for 
in  the  endless  realms  of  denial.  All  Theologies  and 
sacred  Cosmogonies  belong,  in  some  measure,  to  the 
first  class ;  in  all  Pyrrhonism,  from  Pyrrho  down  to 
Hume  and  the  innumerable  disciples  of  Hume,  we 
have  instances  enough  of  the  second.  In  the  former, 
so  far  as  it  affords  satisfaction,  a  temporary  anodyne 
to  doubt,  an  arena  for  wholesome  action,  there  may 
be  much  good;  indeed  in  this  case,  it  holds  rather 
of  Poetry  than  of  Metaphysics,  might  be  called 
Inspiration  rather  than  Speculation.  The  latter  is 
Metaphysics  proper ;  a  pure,  unmixed,  though  from 
time  to  time  a  necessary  evil. 

For  truly,  if  we  look  into  it,  there  is  no  more 
fruitless  endeavour  than  this  same,  which  the  Meta- 
physician proper  toils  in :  to  educe  Conviction  out 
of  Negation.  How,  by  merely  testing  and  rejecting 
what  is  not,  shall  we  ever  attain  knowledge  of  what 
is  ?  Metaphysical  Speculation,  as  it  begins  in  No  or 
Nothingness,  so  it  must  needs  end  in  Nothingness ; 
circulates  and  must  circulate  in  endless  vortices; 
creating,  swallowing  —  itself.  Our  being  is  made 
up  of  Light  and  Darkness,  the  Light  resting  on  the 
Darkness,  and  balancing  it ;  .  everywhere  there  is 
Dualism,  Equipoise;  a  perpetual  Contradiction 
dwells  in  us :  "  where  shall  I  place  myself  to  escape 
from  my  own  shadow?"  Consider  it  well,  Meta- 


Carlyle  213 

physics  is  the  attempt  of  the  mind  to  rise  above  the 
mind ;  to  environ  and  shut  in,  or  as  we  say,  compre- 
hend the  mind.  Hopeless  struggle,  for  the  wisest, 
as  for  the  foolishest!  What  strength  of  sinew,  or 
athletic  skill,  will  enable  the  stoutest  athlete  to  fold 
his  own  body  in  his  arms,  and,  by  lifting,  lift  up 
himself?  The  Irish  Saint  swam  the  Channel, 
"  carrying  his  head  in  his  teeth  " ;  but  the  feat  has 
never  been  imitated. 

That  this  is  the  age  of  Metaphysics,  in  the  proper, 
or  sceptical  Inquisitory  sense;  that  there  was  a 
necessity  for  its  being  such  an  age,  we  regard 
as  our  indubitable  misfortune.  From  many  causes, 
the  arena  of  free  Activity  has  long  been  narrow- 
ing, that  of  sceptical  Inquiry  becoming  more  and 
more  universal,  more  and  more  perplexing.  The 
Thought  conducts  not  to  the  Deed;  but  in  bound- 
less chaos,  self-devouring,  engenders  monstrosi- 
ties, phantasms,  fire-breathing  chimeras.  Profitable 
Speculation  were  this:  What  is  to  be  done;  and 
How  is  it  to  be  done  ?  But  with  us  not  so  much  as 
the  What  can  be  got  sight  of.  For  some  gener- 
ations, all  Philosophy  has  been  a  painful,  captious, 
hostile  question  towards  everything  in  the  Heaven 
above,  and  in  the  Earth  beneath :  Why  art  thou 
there?  Till  at  length  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the 
worth  and  authenticity  of  all  things  seems  dubitable 
or  deniable :  our  best  effort  must  be  unproductively 
spent  not  in  working,  but  in  ascertaining  our  mere 
Whereabout,  and  so  much  as  whether  we  are  to 
work  at  all.  Doubt,  which,  as  was  said,  ever  hangs 
in  the  background  of  our  world,  has  now  become 
our  middleground  and  foreground;  whereon,  for 
the  time,  no  fair  Life-picture  can  be  painted,  but 


214  Best  English  Essays 

only  the  dark  air-canvas  itself  flow  round  us,  be- 
wildering and  benighting. 

Nevertheless,  doubt  as  we  will,  man  is  actually 
Here ;  not  to  ask  questions,  but  to  do  work :  in  this 
time,  as  in  all  times,  it  must  be  the  heaviest  evil 
for  him,  if  his  faculty  of  Action  lie  dormant,  and 
only  that  of  sceptical  Inquiry  exert  itself.  Accord- 
ingly, whoever  looks  abroad  upon  the  world,  com- 
paring the  Past  with  the  Present,  may  find  that  the 
practical  condition  of  man  in  these  days  is  one  of 
the  saddest;  burdened  with  miseries  which  are  in 
a  considerable  degree  peculiar.  In  no  time  was 
man's  life  what  he  calls  a  happy  one ;  in  no  time  can 
it  be  so.  A  perpetual  dream  there  has  been  of 
Paradises,  and  some  luxurious  Lubberland,  where 
the  brooks  should  run  wine,  and  the  trees  bend  with 
ready-baked  viands ;  but  it  was  a  dream  merely ; 
an  impossible  dream.  Suffering,  contradiction, 
error,  have  their  quite  perennial,  and  even  indis- 
pensable abode  in  this  Earth.  Is  not  labour  the  in- 
heritance of  man  ?  And  what  labour  for  the  present 
is  joyous,  and  not  grievous?  Labour,  effort,  is  the 
very  interruption  of  that  ease,  which  man  foolishly 
enough  fancies  to  be  his  happiness ;  and  yet  without 
labour  there  were  no  ease,  no  rest,  so  much  as  con- 
ceivable. Thus  Evil,  what  we  call  Evil,  must  ever 
exist  while  man  exists :  Evil,  in  the  widest  sense 
we  can  give  it,  is  precisely  the  dark,  disordered  ma- 
terial out  of  which  man's  Freewill  has  to  create  an 
edifice  of  order  and  Good.  Ever  must  Pain  urge  us 
to  Labour ;  and  only  in  free  Effort  can  any  blessed- 
ness be  imagined  for  us. 

But  if  man  has,  in  all  ages,  had  enough  to  en- 
counter, there  has,  in  most  civilised  ages,  been  an 


Carlyle  215 

inward  force  vouchsafed  him,  whereby  the  pressure 
of  things  outward  might  be  withstood.  Obstruction 
abounded;  but  Faith  also  was  not  wanting.  It  is 
by  Faith  that  man  removes  mountains:  while  he 
had  Faith,  his  limbs  might  be  wearied  with  toiling, 
his  back  galled  with  bearing;  but  the  heart  within 
him  was  peaceable  and  resolved.  In  the  thickest 
gloom  there  burnt  a  lamp  to  guide  him.  If  he 
struggled  and  suffered,  he  felt  that  it  even  should 
be  so;  knew  for  what  he  was  suffering  and  strug- 
gling. Faith  gave  him  an  inward  Willingness ;  a 
world  of  Strength  wherewith  to  front  a  world  of 
Difficulty.  The  true  wretchedness  lies  here:  that 
the  Difficulty  remain  and  the  Strength  be  lost ;  that 
Pain  cannot  relieve  itself  in  free  Effort;  that  we 
have  the  Labour,  and  want  the  Willingness.  Faith 
strengthens  us,  enlightens  us,  for  all  endeavours  and 
endurances;  with  Faith  we  can  do  all,  and  dare 
all,  and  life  itself  has  a  thousand  times  been  joy- 
fully given  away.  But  the  sum  of  man's  misery  is 
even  this,  that  he  feel  himself  crushed  under  the 
Juggernaut  wheels,  and  know  that  Juggernaut  is 
no  divinity,  but  a  dead  mechanical  idol. 

Xow  this  is  specially  the  misery  which  has  fallen 
on  man  in  our  Era.  Belief,  Faith  has  wellnigh 
vanished  from  the  world.  The  youth  on  awaken- 
ing in  this  wondrous  Universe  no  longer  finds  a 
competent  theory  of  its  wonders.  Time  was,  when 
if  he  asked  himself,  What  is  man,  What  are  the 
duties  of  man?  the  answer  stood  ready  written  for 
him.  But  now  the  ancient  "  ground-plan  of  the 
All  "  belies  itself  when  brought  into  contact  with 
reality ;  Mother  Church  has,  to  the  most,  become 
a  superannuated  Step-mother,  whose  lessons  go 


216  Best  English  Essays 

disregarded;  or  are  spurned  at,  and  scornfully 
gainsaid.  For  young  Valour  and  thirst  of  Action  no 
ideal  Chivalry  invites  to  heroism,  prescribes  what 
is  heroic:  the  old  ideal  of  Manhood  has  grown 
obsolete,  and  the  new  is  still  invisible  to  us,  and 
we  grope  after  it  in  darkness,  one  clutching  this 
phantom,  another  that ;  Werterism,  Byronism,  even 
Brummelism,  each  has  its  day.  For  Contemplation 
and  love  of  Wisdom,  no  Cloister  now  opens  its 
religious  shades;  the  Thinker  must,  in  all  senses, 
wander  homeless,  too  often  aimless,  looking  up 
to  a  Heaven  which  is  dead  for  him,  round  to  an 
Earth  which  is  deaf.  Action,  in  those  old  days, 
was  easy,  was  voluntary,  for  the  divine  worth  of 
human  things  lay  acknowledged;  Speculation  was 
wholesome,  for  it  ranged  itself  as  the  handmaid  of 
Action;  what  could  not  so  range  itself  died  out 
by  its  natural  death,  by  neglect.  Loyalty  still  hal- 
lowed obedience,  and  made  rule  noble;  there  was 
still  something  to  be  loyal  to:  the  Godlike  stood 
embodied  under  many  a  symbol  in  men's  interests 
and  business;  the  Finite  shadowed  forth  the  In- 
finite; Eternity  looked  through  Time.  The  Life 
of  man  was  encompassed  and  overcanopied  by  a 
glory  of  Heaven,  even  as  his  dwelling-place  by 
the  azure  vault. 

How  changed  in  these  new  days!  Truly  may  it 
be  said,  the  Divinity  has  withdrawn  from  the  Earth ; 
or  veils  himself  in  that  wide-wasting  Whirlwind 
of  a  departing  Era,  wherein  the  fewest  can  discern 
his  goings.  Not  Godhead,  but  an  iron,  ignoble 
circle  of  Necessity  embraces  all  things ;  binds  the 
youth  of  these  times  into  a  sluggish  thrall,  or  else 
exasperates  him  into  a  rebel.  Heroic  Action  is 


Carlyle  217 

paralysed;  for  what  worth  now  remains  unques- 
tionable with  him?  At  the  fervid  period  when  his 
whole  nature  cries  aloud  for  Action,  there  is  nothing 
sacred  under  whose  banner  he  can  act ;  the  course 
and  kind  and  conditions  of  free  Action  are  all  but 
undiscoverable.  Doubt  storms-in  on  him  through 
every  avenue;  inquiries  of  the  deepest,  painfulest 
sort  must  be  engaged  with;  and  the  invincible 
energy  of  young  years  waste  itself  in  sceptical, 
suicidal  cavillings ;  in  passionate  "  questionings  of 
Destiny,"  whereto  no  answer  will  be  returned. 

For  men,  in  whom  the  old  perennial  principle  of 
Hunger  (be  it  Hunger  of  the  poor  Day-drudge  who 
stills  it  with  eighteenpence  a-day,  or  of  the  am- 
bitious Placehunter  who  can  nowise  still  it  with  so 
little)  suffices  to  fill-up  existence,  the  case  is  bad; 
but  not  the  worst.  These  men  have  an  aim,  such 
as  it  is;  and  can  steer  towards  it,  with  chagrin 
enough  truly;  yet,  as  their  hands  are  kept  full, 
without  desperation.  Unhappier  are  they  to  whom 
a  higher  instinct  has  been  given ;  who  struggle 
to  be  persons,  not  machines ;  to  whom  the  Universe 
is  not  a  warehouse,  or  at  best  a  fancy-bazaar,  but 
a  mystic  temple  and  hall  of  doom.  For  such  men 
there  lie  properly  two  courses  open.  The  lower, 
yet  still  an  estimable  class,  take  up  with  worn- 
out  Symbols  of  the  Godlike;  keep  trimming  and 
trucking  between  these  and  Hypocrisy,  purblindly 
enough,  miserably  enough.  A  numerous  interme- 
diate class  end  in  Denial ;  and  form  a  theory  that 
there  is  no  theory;  that  nothing  is  certain  in  the 
world,  except  this  fact  of  Pleasure  being  pleasant ; 
so  they  try  to  realise  what  trifling  modicum  of 
Pleasure  they  can  come  at,  and  to  live  contented 


2i 8  Best  English  Essays 

therewith,  winking-  hard.  Of  these  we  speak  not 
here;  but  only  of  the  second  nobler  class,  who  also 
have  dared  to  say  No,  and  cannot  yet  say  Yea; 
but  feel  that  in  the  No  they  dwell  as  in  a  Golgotha, 
where  life  enters  not,  where  peace  is  not  appointed 
them. 

Hard,  for  most  part,  is  the  fate  of  such  men ;  the 
harder  the  nobler  they  are.  In  dim  forecastings, 
wrestles  within  them  the  "  Divine  Idea  of  the 
World,"  yet  will  nowhere  visibly  reveal  itself.  They 
have  to  realise  a  Worship  for  themselves,  or  live 
unworshipping.  The  Godlike  has  vanished  from 
the  world;  and  they,  by  the  strong  cry  of  their 
soul's  agony,  like  true  wonder-workers,  must  again 
evoke  its  presence.  This  miracle  is  their  appointed 
task;  which  they  must  accomplish,  or  die  wretch- 
edly :  this  miracle  has  been  accomplished  by  such ; 
but  not  in  our  land ;  our  land  yet  knows  not  of  it. 
Behold  a  Byron,  in  melodious  tones,  "  cursing  his 
day  " :  he  mistakes  earthborn  passionate  Desire  for 
heaven-inspired  Freewill ;  without  heavenly  load- 
star, rushes  madly  into  the  dance  of  meteoric  lights 
that  hover  on  the  mad  Mahlstrom ;  and  goes  down 
among  its  eddies.  Hear  a  Shelley  filling  the  earth 
with  inarticulate  wail ;  like  the  infinite,  inarticulate 
grief  and  weeping  of  forsaken  infants.  A  noble 
Friedrich  Schlegel,  stupefied  in  that  fearful  loneli- 
ness, as  of  a  silenced  battle-field,  flies  back  to 
Catholicism ;  as  a  child  might  to  its  slain  mother's 
bosom,  and  cling  there.  In  lower  regions,  how 
many  a  poor  Hazlitt  must  wander  on  God's  verdant 
earth,  like  the  Unblest  on  burning  deserts ;  passion- 
ately dig  wells,  and  draw  up  only  the  dry  quicksand ; 
believe  that  he  is  seeking  Truth,  yet  only  wrestle 


Carlyle  219 

among  endless  Sophisms,  doing-  desperate  battle  as 
with  spectre-hosts ;  and  die  and  make  no  sign ! 

To  the  better  order  of  such  minds  any  mad  joy 
of  Denial  has  long  since  ceased :  the  problem  is  not 
now  to  deny,  but  to  ascertain  and  perform.  Once 
in  destroying  the  False,  there  was  a  certain  inspi- 
ration ;  but  now  the  genius  of  Destruction  has  done 
its  work,  there  is  now  nothing  more  to  destroy. 
The  doom  of  the  Old  has  long  been  pronounced,  and 
irrevocable;  the  Old  has  passed  away:  but,  alas, 
the  New  appears  not  in  its  stead;  the  Time  is  still 
in  pangs  of  travail  with  the  New.  Man  has  walked 
by  the  light  of  conflagrations,  and  amid  the  sound  of 
falling  cities ;  and  now  there  is  darkness,  and  long 
watching  till  it  be  morning.  The  voice  even  of  the 
faithful  can  but  exclaim :  "  As  yet  struggles  the 
twelfth  hour  of  the  Night:  birds  of  darkness  are 
on  the  wing,  spectres  uproar,  the  dead  walk,  the 
living  dream.  —  Thou,  Eternal  Providence,  wilt 
cause  the  day  to  dawn !  "  * 

Such  being  the  condition,  temporal  and  spiritual, 
of  the  world  at  our  Epoch,  can  we  wonder  that  the 
world  "  listens  to  itself,"  and  struggles  and  writhes, 
everywhere  externally  and  internally,  like  a  thing 
in  pain  ?  Nay,  is  not  even  this  unhealthy  action  of 
the  world's  Organisation,  if  the  symptom  of  uni- 
versal disease,  yet  also  the  symptom  and  sole  means 
of  restoration  and  cure?  The  effort  of  Nature, 
exerting  her  medicative  force  to  cast  out  foreign 
impediments,  and  once  more  become  One,  become 
whole?  In  Practice,  still  more  in  Opinion,  which 
is  the  precursor  and  prototype  of  Practice,  there 
must  needs  be  collision,  convulsion ;  much  has  to 
1  Jean  Paul's  "  Hesperus"  (Vorrede). 


22O  Best  English  Essays 

be  ground  away.  Thought  must  needs  be  Doubt 
and  Inquiry,  before  it  can  again  be  Affirmation  and 
Sacred  Precept.  Innumerable  "  Philosophies  of 
Man,"  contending  in  boundless  hubbub,  must  anni- 
hilate each  other,  before  an  inspired  Poesy  and 
Faith  for  Man  can  fashion  itself  together. 

From  this  stunning  hubbub,  a  true  Babel-like 
confusion  of  tongues,  we  have  here  selected  two 
Voices;  less  as  objects  of  praise  or  condemnation, 
than  as  signs  how  far  the  confusion  has  reached, 
what  prospect  there  is  of  its  abating.  Friedrich 
Schlegel's  "  Lectures "  delivered  at  Dresden,  and 
Mr.  Hope's  "  Essay "  published  in  London,  are 
the  latest  utterances  of  European  Speculation:  far 
asunder  in  external  place,  they  stand  at  a  still  wider 
distance  in  inward  purport;  are,  indeed,  so  oppo- 
site and  yet  so  cognate  that  they  may,  in  many 
senses,  represent  the  two  Extremes  of  our  whole 
modern  system  of  Thought ;  and  be  said  to  include 
between  them  all  the  Metaphysical  Philosophies,  so 
often  alluded  to  here,  which,  of  late  times,  from 
France,  Germany,  England,  have  agitated  and  al- 
most overwhelmed  us.  Both  in  regard  to  matter 
and  to  form,  the  relation  of  these  two  Works  is 
significant  enough. 

Speaking  first  of  their  cognate  qualities,  let  us 
remark,  not  without  emotion,  one  quite  extraneous 
point  of  agreement;  the  fact  that  the  Writers  of 
both  have  departed  from  this  world ;  they  have 
now  finished  their  search,  and  had  all  doubts  re- 
solved: while  we  listen  to  the  voice,  the  tongue 
that  uttered  it  has  gone  silent  for  ever.  But  the 
fundamental,  all-pervading  similarity  lies  in  this 


Carlyle  221 

circumstance,  well  worthy  of  being  noted,  that  both 
these  Philosophies  are  of  the  Dogmatic  or  Con- 
structive sort :  each  in  its  way  is  a  kind  of  Genesis ; 
an  endeavour  to  bring  the  Phenomena  of  man's 
Universe  once  more  under  some  theoretic  Scheme: 
in  both  there  is  a  decided  principle  of  unity;  they 
strive  after  a  result  which  shall  be  positive;  their 
aim  is  not  to  question,  but  to  establish.  This,  es- 
pecially if  we  consider  with  what  comprehensive 
concentrated  force  it  is  here  exhibited,  forms  a  new 
feature  in  such  works. 

Under  all  other  aspects,  there  is  the  most  irrecon- 
cilable opposition;  a  staring  contrariety,  such  as 
might  provoke  contrasts,  were  there  far  fewer  points 
of  comparison.  If  Schlegel's  Work  is  the  apothe- 
osis of  Spiritualism ;  Hope's  again  is  the  apotheosis 
of  Materialism :  in  the  one,  all  Matter  is  evaporated 
into  a  Phenomenon,  and  terrestrial  Life  itself,  with 
its  whole  doings  and  showings,  held  out  as  a  Dis- 
turbance (Zerriittung)  produced  by  the  Zeitgeist 
(Spirit  of  Time)  ;  in  the  other,  Matter  is  distilled 
and  sublimated  into  some  semblance  of  Divinity : 
the  one  regards  Space  and  Time  as  mere  forms 
of  man's  mind,  and  without  external  existence  or 
reality;  the  other  supposes  Space  and  Time  to  be 
"  incessantly  created,"  and  rayed-in  upon  us  like 
a  sort  of  "  gravitation."  Such  is  their  difference  in 
respect  of  purport :  no  less  striking  is  it  in  respect 
of  manner,  talent,  success  and  all  outward  char- 
acteristics. Thus,  if  in  Schlegel  we  have  to  admire 
the  power  of  Words,  in  Hope  we  stand  astonished, 
it  might  almost  be  said,  at  the  want  of  an  articulate 
Language.  To  Schlegel  his  Philosophic  Speech  is 
obedient,  dextrous,  exact,  like  a  promptly  minis- 


222  Best  English  Essays 

tering  genius ;  his  names  are  so  clear,  so  precise 
and  vivid,  that  they  almost  (sometimes  altogether) 
become  things  for  him :  with  Hope  there  is  no 
Philosophical  Speech ;  but  a  painful,  confused  stam- 
mering, and  struggling  after  such ;  or  the  tongue, 
as  in  doatish  forgetfulness,  maunders,  low,  long- 
winded,  and  speaks  not  the  word  intended,  but 
another;  so  that  here  the  scarcely  intelligible,  in 
these  endless  convolutions,  becomes  the  wholly  un- 
readable ;  and  often  we  could  ask,  as  that  mad  pupil 
did  of  his  tutor  in  Philosophy,  "  But  whether  is 
Virtue  a  fluid,  then,  or  a  gas?"  If  the  fact,  that 
Schlegel,  in  the  city  of  Dresden,  could  find  audience 
for  such  high  discourse,  may  excite  our  envy ;  this 
other  fact,  that  a  person  of  strong  powers,  skilled  in 
English  Thought  and  master  of  its  Dialect,  could 
write  the  "  Origin  and  Prospects  of  Man,"  may 
painfully  remind  us  of  the  reproach,  that  England 
has  now  no  language  for  Meditation ;  that  England, 
the  most  calculative,  is  the  least  meditative,  of  all 
civilised  countries. 

It  is  not  our  purpose  to  offer  any  criticism  of 
Schlegel's  Book;  in  such  limits  as  were  possible 
here,  we  should  despair  of  communicating  even  the 
faintest  image  of  its  significance.  To  the  mass  of 
readers,  indeed,  both  among  the  Germans  them- 
selves, and  still  more  elsewhere,  it  nowise  addresses 
itself,  and  may  lie  for  ever  sealed.  We  point  it  out 
as  a  remarkable  document  of  the  Time  and  of  the 
Man ;  can  recommend  it,  moreover,  to  all  earnest 
Thinkers,  as  a  work  deserving  their  best  regard; 
a  work  full  of  deep  meditation,  wherein  the  infinite 
mystery  of  Life,  if  not  represented,  is  decisively 
recognised.  Of  Schlegel  himself,  and  his  character, 


Carlyle  223 

and  spiritual  history,  we  can  profess  no  thorough 
or  final  understanding ;  yet  enough  to  make  us  view 
him  with  admiration  and  pity,  nowise  with  harsh 
contemptuous  censure ;  and  must  say,  with  clearest 
persuasion,  that  the  outcry  of  his  being  "  a  rene- 
gade," and  so  forth,  is  but  like  other  such  outcries, 
a  judgment  where  there  was  neither  jury,  nor  evi- 
dence, nor  judge.  The  candid  reader,  in  this  Book 
itself,  to  say  nothing  of  all  the  rest,  will  find  traces 
of  a  high,  far-seeing,  earnest  spirit,  to  whom  "  Aus- 
trian Pensions,"  and  the  Kaiser's  crown,  and  Austria 
altogether,  were  but  a  light  matter  to  the  finding 
and  vitally  appropriating  of  Truth.  Let  us  respect 
the  sacred  mystery  of  a  Person ;  rush  not  irrev- 
erently into  man's  Holy  of  Holies !  Were  the  lost 
little  one,  as  we  said  already,  found  "  sucking  its 
dead  mother,  on  the  field  of  carnage,"  could  it  be 
other  than  a  spectacle  for  tears  ?  A  solemn  mourn- 
ful feeling  comes  over  us  when  we  see  this  last 
Work  of  Friedrich  Schlegel,  the  unwearied  seeker, 
end  abruptly  in  the  middle ;  and,  as  if  he  had  not 
yet  found,  as  if  emblematically  of  much,  end  with 
an  "Aber—,"  with  a  "But  —  "  !  This  was  the 
last  word  that  came  from  the  Pen  of  Friedrich 
Schlegel:  about  eleven  at  night  he  wrote  it  down, 
and  there  paused  sick;  at  one  in  the  morning, 
Time  for  him  had  merged  itself  in  Eternity;  he 
was,  as  we  say,  no  more. 

Still  less  can  we  attempt  any  criticism  of  Mr. 
Hope's  new  "  Book  of  Genesis."  Indeed,  under  any 
circumstances,  criticism  of  it  were  now  impossible. 
Such  an  utterance  could  only  be  responded  to  in 
peals  of  laughter;  and  laughter  sounds  hollow  and 
hideous  through  the  vaults  of  the  dead.  Of  this 


224  Best  English  Essays 

monstrous  Anomaly,  where  all  sciences  are  heaped 
and  huddled  together,  and  the  principles  of  all  are, 
with  a  childlike  innocence,  plied  hither  and  thither, 
or  wholly  abolished  in  case  of  need;  where  the 
First  Cause  is  figured  as  a  huge  Circle,  with  nothing 
to  do  but  radiate  "  gravitation  "  towards  its  centre ; 
and  so  construct  a  Universe,  wherein  all,  from  the 
lowest  cucumber  with  its  coolness,  up  to  the  highest 
seraph  with  his  love,  were  but  "  gravitation,"  direct 
or  reflex,  "  in  more  or  less  central  globes,"  —  what 
can  we  say,  except,  with  sorrow  and  shame,  that 
it  could  have  originated  nowhere  save  in  England? 
It  is  a  general  agglomerate  of  all  facts,  notions, 
whims  and  observations,  as  they  lie  in  the  brain  of 
an  English  gentleman ;  as  an  English  gentleman,  of 
unusual  thinking  power,  is  led  to  fashion  them,  in 
his  schools  and  in  his  world:  all  these  thrown  into 
the  crucible,  and  if  not  fused,  yet  soldered  or  conglu- 
tinated  with  boundless  patience;  and  now  tumbled 
out  here,  heterogeneous,  amorphous,  unspeakable,  a 
world's  wonder.  Most  melancholy  must  we  name 
the  whole  business ;  full  of  long-continued  thought, 
earnestness,  loftiness  of  mind ;  not  without  glances 
into  the  Deepest,  a  constant  fearless  endeavour  after 
truth ;  and  with  all  this  nothing  accomplished,  but 
the  perhaps  absurdest  Book  written  in  our  century 
by  a  thinking  man.  A  shameful  Abortion ;  which, 
however,  need  not  now  be  smothered  or  mangled, 
for  it  is  already  dead;  only,  in  our  love  and  sor- 
rowing reverence  for  the  writer  of  "  Anastasius," 
and  the  heroic  seeker  of  Light,  though  not  bringer 
thereof,  let  it  be  buried  and  forgotten. 

For  ourselves,  the  loud   discord  which   jars   in 
these  two  Works,  in  innumerable  works  of  the  like 


Carlyle  425 

import,  and  generally  in  all  the  Thought  and  Action 
of  this  period,  does  not  any  longer  utterly  confuse 
us.  Unhappy  who,  in  such  a  time>  felt  not,  at  all 
conjunctures,  ineradicably  in  his  heart  the  knowl- 
edge that  a  God  made  this  Universe,  and  a  Demon 
not!  And  shall  Evil  always  prosper,  then?  Out 
of  all  Evil  comes  Good;  and  no  Good  that  is  pos- 
sible but  shall  one  day  be  real.  Deep  and  sad  as 
is  our  feeling  that  we  stand  yet  in  the  bodeful 
Night ;  equally  deep,  indestructible  is  our  assurance 
that  the  Morning  also  will  not  fail.  Nay  already, 
as  we  look  round,  streaks  of  a  dayspring  are  in  the 
east;  it  is  dawning;  when  the  time  shall  be  ful- 
filled, it  will  be  day.  The  progress  of  man  towards 
higher  and  nobler  developments  of  whatever  is 
highest  and  noblest  in  him,  lies  not  only  prophesied 
to  Faith,  but  now  written  to  the  eye  of  Observation, 
so  that  he  who  runs  may  read. 

One  great  step  of  progress,  for  example,  we 
should  say,  in  actual  circumstances,  was  this  same ; 
the  clear  ascertainment  that  we  are  in  progress. 
About  the  grand  Course  of  Providence,  and  his 
final  Purposes  with  us,  we  can  know  nothing,  or 
almost  nothing:  man  begins  in  darkness,  ends  in 
darkness ;  mystery  is  everywhere  around  us  and 
in  us,  under  our  feet,  among  our  hands.  Never- 
theless so  much  has  become  evident  to  every  one, 
that  this  wondrous  Mankind  is  advancing  some- 
whither; that  at  least  all  human  things  are,  have 
been  and  for  ever  will  be,  in  Movement  and  Change ; 
—  as,  indeed,  for  beings  that  exist  in  Time,  by 
virtue  of  Time,  and  are  made  of  Time,  might  have 
been  long  since  understood.  In  some  provinces,  it 
is  true,  as  in  Experimental  Science,  this  discovery  is 

15 


226  Best  English  Essays 

an  old  one ;  but  in  most  others  it  belongs  wholly 
to  these  latter  days.  How  often,  in  former  ages, 
by  eternal  Creeds,  eternal  Forms  of  Government 
and  the  like,  has  it  been  attempted,  fiercely  enough, 
and  with  destructive  violence,  to  chain  the  Future 
under  the  Past;  and  say  to  the  Providence,  whose 
ways  with  man  are  mysterious,  and  through  the 
great  deep:  Hitherto  shalt  thou  come,  but  no 
farther!  A  wholly  insane  attempt;  and  for  man 
himself,  eould  it  prosper,  the  frightfulest  of  all 
enchantments,  a  very  Life-in-Death.  Man's  task 
here  below,  the  destiny  of  every  individual  man, 
is  to  be  in  turns  Apprentice  and  Workman ;  or  say 
rather,  Scholar,  Teacher,  Discoverer:  by  nature  he 
has  a  strength  for  learning,  for  imitating;  but  also 
a  strength  for  acting,  for  knowing  on  his  own 
account.  Are  we  not  in  a  world  seen  to  be  Infinite ; 
the  relations  lying  closest  together  modified  by  those 
latest  discovered  and  lying  farthest  asunder  ?  Could 
you  ever  spell-bind  man  into  a  Scholar  merely,  so 
that  he  had  nothing  to  discover,  to  correct ;  could 
you  ever  establish  a  Theory  of  the  Universe  that 
were  entire,  unimprovable,  and  which  needed  only 
to  be  got  by  heart ;  man  then  were  spiritually 
defunct,  the  Species  we  now  name  Man  had  ceased 
to  exist.  But  the  gods,  kinder  to  us  than  we  are 
to  ourselves,  have  forbidden  such  suicidal  acts.  As 
Phlogiston  is  displaced  by  Oxygen,  and  the  Epi- 
cycles of  Ptolemy  by  the  Ellipses  of  Kepler;  so 
does  Paganism  give  place  to  Catholicism,  Tyranny 
to  Monarchy,  and  Feudalism  to  Representative  Gov- 
ernment, —  where  also  the  process  does  not  stop. 
Perfection  of  Practice,  like  completeness  of  Opinion, 
is  always  approaching,  never  arrived ;  Truth,  in 


Carlyle  227 

the  words  of  Schiller,  immer  wird,  nie  ist;  never  is, 
always  is  a-being. 

Sad,  truly,  were  our  condition  did  we  know 
but  this,  that  Change  is  universal  and  inevitable. 
Launched  into  a  dark  shoreless  sea  of  Pyrrhonism, 
what  would  remain  for  us  but  to  sail  aimless,  hope- 
less; or  make  madly  merry,  while  the  devouring 
Death  had  not  yet  engulfed  us  ?  As  indeed,  we  have 
seen  many,  and  still  see  many  do.  Nevertheless  so 
stands  it  not.  The  venerator  of  the  Past  (and  to 
what  pure  heart  is  the  Past,  in  that  "  moonlight  of 
memory,"  other  than  sad  and  holy?)  sorrows  not 
over  its  departure,  as  one  utterly  bereaved.  The 
true  Past  departs  not,  nothing  that  was  worthy  in 
the  Past  departs;  no  Truth  or  Goodness  realised 
by  man  ever  dies,  or  can  die;  but  is  all  still  here, 
and,  recognised  or  not,  lives  and  works  through 
endless  changes.  If  all  things,  to  speak  in  the  Ger- 
man dialect,  are  discerned  by  us,  and  exist  for  us, 
in  an  element  of  Time,  and  therefore  of  Mortality 
and  Mutability ;  yet  Time  itself  reposes  on  Eternity : 
the  truly  Great  and  Transcendental  has  its  basis 
and  substance  in  Eternity;  stands  revealed  to  us 
as  Eternity  in  a  vesture  of  Time.  Thus  in  all 
Poetry,  Worship,  Art,  Society,  as  one  form  passes 
into  another,  nothing  is  lost:  it  is  but  the  super- 
ficial, as  it  were  the  body  only,  that  grows  obsolete 
and  dies ;  under  the  mortal  body  lies  a  soul  which 
is  immortal ;  which  anew  incarnates  itself  in  fairer 
revelation ;  and  the  Present  is  the  living  sum-total 
of  the  whole  Past. 

In  Change,  therefore,  there  is  nothing  terrible, 
nothing  supernatural:  on  the  contrary,  it  lies  in 
the  very  essence  of  our  lot  and  life  in  this  world. 


228  Best  English  Essays 

To-day  is  not  yesterday :  we  ourselves  change ;  how 
can  our  Works  and  Thoughts,  if  they  are  always  to 
be  the  fittest,  continue  always  the  same?  Change, 
indeed,  is  painful;  yet  ever  needful;  and  if  Mem- 
ory have  its  force  and  worth,  so  also  has  Hope. 
Nay,  if  we  look  well  to  it,  what  is  all  Derangement, 
and  necessity  of  great  Change,  in  itself  such  an 
evil,  but  the  product  simply  of  increased  resources 
which  the  old  methods  can  no  longer  administer; 
of  new  wealth  which  the  old  coffers  will  no  longer 
contain?  What  is  it,  for  example,  that  in  our  own 
day  bursts  asunder  the  bonds  of  ancient  Political 
Systems,  and  perplexes  all  Europe  with  the  fear  of 
Change,  but  even  this :  the  increase  of  social  re- 
sources, which  the  old  social  methods  will  no  longer 
sufficiently  administer?  The  new  omnipotence  of 
the  Steam-engine  is  hewing  asunder  quite  other 
mountains  than  the  physical.  Have  not  our  eco- 
nomical distresses,  those  barnyard  Conflagrations 
themselves,  the  frightfulest  madness  of  our  mad 
epoch,  their  rise  also  in  what  is  a  real  increase: 
increase  of  Men;  of  human  Force;  properly,  in 
such  a  Planet  as  ours,  the  most  precious  of  all  in- 
creases? It  is  true  again,  the  ancient  methods  of 
administration  will  no  longer  suffice.  Must  the 
indomitable  millions,  full  of  old  Saxon  energy  and 
fire,  lie  cooped-up  in  this  Western  nook,  choking 
one  another,  as  in  a  Blackhole  of  Calcutta,  while  a 
whole  fertile  untenanted  Earth,  desolate  for  want 
of  the  ploughshare,  cries :  Come  and  till  me,  come 
and  reap  me?  If  the  ancient  Captains  can  no  longer 
yield  guidance,  new  must  be  sought  after:  for  the 
difficulty  lies  not  in  nature,  but  in  artifice ;  the  Euro- 
pean Calcutta-Blackhole  has  no  walls  but  air  ones 


Carlyle  229 

and  paper  ones.  —  So,  too,  Scepticism  itself,  with 
its  innumerable  mischiefs,  what  is  it  but  the  sour 
fruit  of  a  most  blessed  increase,  that  of  Knowledge ; 
a  fruit  too  that  will  not  always  continue  sour? 

In  fact,  much  as  we  have  said  and  mourned  about 
the  unproductive  prevalence  of  Metaphysics,  it  was 
not  without  some  insight  into  the  use  that  lies  in 
them.  Metaphysical  Speculation,  if  a  necessary 
evil,  is  the  forerunner  of  much  good.  The  fever  of 
Scepticism  must  needs  burn  itself  out,  and  burn  out 
thereby  the  Impurities  that  caused  it ;  then  again 
will  there  be  clearness,  health.  The  principle  of  life, 
which  now  struggles  painfully,  in  the  outer,  thin 
and  barren  domain  of  the  Conscious  or  Mechan- 
ical, may  then  withdraw  into  its  inner  sanctua- 
ries, its  abysses  of  mystery  and  miracle;  withdraw 
deeper  than  ever  into  that  domain  of  the  Uncon- 
scious, by  nature  infinite  and  inexhaustible ;  and  cre- 
atively work  there.  From  that  mystic  region,  and 
from  that  alone,  all  wonders,  all  Poesies,  and  Re- 
ligions, and  Social'  Systems  have  proceeded:  the 
like  wonders,  and  greater  and  higher,  lie  slumbering 
there ;  and,  brooded  on  by  the  spirit  of  the  waters, 
will  evolve  themselves,  and  rise  like  exhalations 
from  the  Deep. 

Of  our  Modern  Metaphysics,  accordingly,  may 
not  this  already  be  said,  that  if  they  have  produced 
no  Affirmation,  they  have  destroyed  much  Nega- 
tion ?  It  is  a  disease  expelling  a  disease :  the  fire  of 
Doubt,  as  above  hinted,  consuming  away  the  Doubt- 
ful ;  that  so  the  Certain  come  to  light,  and  again  lie 
visible  on  the  surface.  English  or  French  Meta- 
physics, in  reference  to  this  last  stage  of  the  specu- 
lative process,  are  not  what  we  allude  to  here ;  but 


230  Best  English  Essays 

only  the  Metaphysics  of  the  Germans.  In  France 
or  England,  since  the  days  of  Diderot  and  Hume, 
though  all  thought  has  been  of  a  sceptico-meta- 
physical  texture,  so  far  as  there  was  any  Thought, 
we  have  seen  no  Metaphysics ;  but  only  more  or  less 
ineffectual  questionings  whether  such  could  be.  In 
the  Pyrrhonism  of  Hume  and  the  Materialism  of 
Diderot,  Logic  had,  as  it  were,  overshot  itself,  over- 
set itself.  Now,  though  the  athlete,  to  use  our  old 
figure,  cannot,  by  much  lifting,  lift  up  his  own 
body,  he  may  shift  it  out  of  a  laming  posture,  and 
get  to  stand  in  a  free  one.  Such  a  service  have 
German  Metaphysics  done  for  man's  mind.  The 
second  sickness  of  Speculation  has  abolished  both 
itself  and  the  first.  Friedrich  Schlegel  complains 
much  of  the  fruitlessness,  the  tumult  and  transiency 
of  German  as  of  all  Metaphysics ;  and  with  reason. 
Yet  in  that  wide-spreading,  deep-whirling  vortex 
of  Kantism,  so  soon  metamorphosed  into  Fichteism, 
Schellingism,  and  then  as  Hegelism,  and  Cousinism, 
perhaps  finally  evaporated,  is  not  this  issue  visible 
enough,  That  Pyrrhonism  and  Materialism,  them- 
selves necessary  phenomena  in  European  culture, 
have  disappeared ;  and  a  Faith  in  Religion  has 
again  become  possible  and  inevitable  for  the  scien- 
tific mind;  and  the  word  Freethinker  no  longer 
means  the  Denier  or  Caviller,  but  the  Believer,  or 
the  Ready  to  believe?  Nay,  in  the  higher  Litera- 
ture of  Germany,  there  already  lies,  for  him  that 
can  read  it,  the  beginning  of  a  new  revelation  of  the 
Godlike;  as  yet  unrecognised  by  the  mass  of  the 
world ;  but  waiting  there  for  recognition,  and  sure 
to  find  it  when  the  fit  hour  comes.  This  age  also 
is  not  wholly  without  its  Prophets. 


Carlyle  23 1 

Again,  under  another  aspect,  if  Utilitarianism,  or 
Radicalism,  or  the  Mechanical  Philosophy,  or  by 
whatever  name  it  is  called,  has  still  its  long  task  to 
do ;  nevertheless  we  can  now  see  through  it  and  be- 
yond it :  in  the  better  heads,  even  among  us  English, 
it  has  become  obsolete ;  as  in  other  countries,  it  has 
been,  in  such  heads,  for  some  forty  or  even  fifty 
years.  What  sound  mind  among  the  French,  for 
example,  now  fancies  that  men  can  be  governed  by 
"  Constitutions  " ;  by  the  never  so  cunning  mechan- 
ising of  Self-interests,  and  all  conceivable  adjust- 
ments of  checking  and  balancing ;  in  a  word,  by  the 
best  possible  solution  of  this  quite  insoluble  and  im- 
possible problem,  Given  a  world  of  Knaves,  to  pro- 
duce an  Honesty  from  their  united  action f  Were 
not  experiments  enough  of  this  kind  tried  before  all 
Europe,  and  found  wanting,  when,  in  that  dooms- 
day of  France,  the  infinite  gulf  of  human  Passion 
shivered  asunder  the  thin  rinds  of  Habit ;  and  burst 
forth  all-devouring,  as  in  seas  of  Nether  Fire? 
Which  cunningly-devised  "  Constitution,"  consti- 
tutional, republican,  democratic,  sansculottic,  could 
bind  that  raging  chasm  together?  Were  they  not 
all  burnt  up,  like  paper  as  they  were,  in  its  molten 
eddies;  and  still  the  fire-sea  raged  fiercer  than 
before?  It  is  not  by  Mechanism,  but  by  Religion; 
not  by  Self-interest,  but  by  Loyalty,  that  men  are 
governed  or  governable. 

Remarkable  it  is,  truly,  how  everywhere  the 
eternal  fact  begins  again  to  be  recognised,  that  there 
is  a  Godlike  in  human  affairs ;  that  God  not  only 
made  us  and  beholds  us,  but  is  in  us  and  around  us  ; 
that  the  Age  of  Miracles,  as  it  ever  was,  now  is. 
Such  recognition  we  discern  on  all  hands  and  in  all 


232  Best  English  Essays 

countries:  in  each  country  after  its  own  fashion. 
In  France,  among  the  younger  nobler  minds, 
strangely  enough;  where,  in  their  loud  contention 
with  the  Actual  and  Conscious,  the  Ideal  or  Uncon- 
scious is,  for  the  time,  without  exponent;  where 
Religion  means  not  the  parent  of  Polity,  as  of  all 
that  is  highest,  but  Polity  itself;  and  this  and  the 
other  earnest  man  has  not  been  wanting,  who  could 
audibly  whisper  to  himself :  "  Go  to,  I  will  make  a 
religion."  In  England  still  more  strangely;  as  in 
all  things,  worthy  England  will  have  its  way:  by 
the  shrieking  of  hysterical  women,  casting  out  of 
devils,  and  other  "  gifts  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  Well 
might  Jean  Paul  say,  in  this  his  twelfth  hour  of  the 
Night,  "  the  living  dream  " ;  well  might  he  say, 
"  the  dead  walk."  Meanwhile  let  us  rejoice  rather 
that  so  much  has  been  seen  into,  were  it  through 
never  so  diffracting  media,  and  never  so  madly  dis- 
torted; that  in  all  dialects,  though  but  half-articu- 
lately,  this  high  Gospel  begins  to  be  preached :  Man 
is  still  Man.  The  genius  of  Mechanism,  as  was 
once  before  predicted,  will  not  always  sit  like  a 
choking  incubus  on  our  soul;  but  at  length,  when 
by  a  new  magic  Word  the  old  spell  is  broken,  be- 
come our  slave,  and  as  familiar-spirit  do  all  our 
bidding.  "  We  are  near  awakening  when  we  dream 
that  we  dream." 

He  that  has  an  eye  and  a  heart  can  even  now  say : 
Why  should  I  falter?  Light  has  come  into  the 
world ;  to  such  as  love  Light,  so  as  Light  must  be 
loved,  with  a  boundless  all-doing,  all-enduring  love. 
For  the  rest,  let  that  vain  struggle  to  read  the  mystery 
of  the  Infinite  cease  to  harass  us.  It  is  a  mystery 
which,  through  all  ages,  we  shall  only  read  here  a 


Carlyle  233 

line  of,  there  another  line  of.  Do  we  not  already 
know  that  the  name  of  the  Infinite  is  GOOD,  is  GOD  ? 
Here  on  Earth  we  are  as  Soldiers,  fighting  in  a 
foreign  land;  that  understand  not  the  plan  of  the 
campaign,  and  have  no  need  to  understand  it;  see- 
ing well  what  is  at  our  hand  to  be  done.  Let  us  do 
it  like  Soldiers ;  with  submission,  with  courage, 
with  a  heroic  joy.  "  Whatsoever  thy  hand  findeth 
to  do,  do  it  with  all  thy  might."  Behind  us,  behind 
each  one  of  us,  lie  Six  Thousand  Years  of  human 
effort,  human  conquest:  before  us  is  the  boundless 
Time,  with  its  as  yet  uncreated  and  unconquered 
Continents  and  Eldorados,  which  we,  even  we,  have 
to  conquer,  to  create ;  and  from  the  bosom  of  Eter- 
nity there  shine  for  us  celestial  guiding  stars. 

"  My  inheritance  how  wide  and  fair ! 
Time  is  my  fair  seed-field,  of  Time  I  'm  heir." 


VII 
EMERSON 


EMERSON: 
THE   LECTURER 

IF  Carlyle  was  the  prophet  who  spoke  in 
words  which  compelled  attention,  and  Ma- 
caulay  was  the  orator  who  won  attention 
by  his  eloquence,  Emerson  was  the  lecturer  who 
gained  and  held  the  attention  of  those  who 
chanced  to  read  him  by  the  simple  interest  of  what 
he  had  to  say.  While  he  was  devoted  to  the  phi- 
losophy which  he  tried  to  illustrate,  deeply  de- 
voted, still  he  did  not  conceive  it  to  be  a  gospel 
which  he  was  to  preach  at  all  hazards,  and  his 
motives  were  too  impersonal  to  make  him  in- 
clined to  use  the  persuasive  arts  of  the  orator. 
He  was  a  seer  who  realized  that  he  saw  more 
deeply  into  the  essential  truths  of  life  than  his 
fellows,  and  he  wished  as  far  as  he  could  to  enable 
all  men  to  see  as  he  saw.  Still  he  had  such  con- 
fidence in  the  power  of  truth,  and  especially  of  the 
truth  he  had  to  state,  that  he  was  never  inclined 
to  force  or  press  his  point.  He  merely  offered 
what  he  had,  and  those  who  cared  might  take  it. 
Emerson  called  himself  a  Transcendentalist. 
He  had  in  reality  come  to  perceive  the  essential 
points  of  the  philosophy  of  Kant,  Comte,  Hegel, 


238  Best  English  Essays 

and  their  fellows,  which  taught  in  effect  that  man, 
matter,  and  God  are  not  three  separate  entities, 
but  merely  manifestations  of  one  and  the  same 
substance.  Hence  both  man  and  matter  are  seen 
to  be  divine  in  substance,  the  words  "human"  and 
"material"  merely  indicating  limitation.  There- 
fore the  laws  of  nature  are  also  the  laws  of  God, 
and  in  our  own  hearts  we  have  a  bit  of  the  divine 
which  we  may  study  at  first  hand  if  we  will. 
Emerson  knew  that  to  state  this  philosophy  baldly 
would  make  it  mean  nothing  in  the  ordinary 
man's  mental  economy;  so  he  proceeded  to  give 
it  as  practically  applied  to  the  various  simple 
problems  of  life.  The  reader's  intuition  would 
show  him  the  truth  of  each  application ;  and  when 
he  has  applied  the  general  principle  in  a  few  hun- 
dred or  thousand  special  instances  and  illustra- 
tions, he  becomes  unconsciously  imbued  with  the 
general  principle  itself,  though  he  may  not  be 
able  to  state  it  in  general  terms,  or  even  under- 
stand that  he  is  possessed  of  anything  he  has  not 
always  had. 

Once  possessed  of  the  philosophic  key,  the 
lecturer  himself  easily  perceives  each  particular 
application;  but  making  it  clear  to  the  reader  is 
a  serious  problem.  A  plain  statement  will  not  do, 
for  there  is  no  language  in  which  the  funda- 
mental ideas  can  be  expressed  which  the  ordinary 
reader  will  comprehend.  The  mere  philosopher 
proceeds  to  create  a  technical  language  of  his 
own;  the  lecturer  for  a  popular  audience  can- 


Emerson  239 

not  do  that,  but  must  make  himself  understood 
through  images  and  combinations  of  common 
notions.  A  language  of  figures  and  parables 
must  be  created  instead  of  a  technical  one.  The 
problem  is  at  once  the  simplest  and  the  most  diffi- 
cult which  the  creative  writer  has  to  face. 

As  Emerson's  object  is  to  give  his  reader  the 
general  point  of  view,  with  all  its  revelations,  and 
as  he  sets  out  to  do  this  by  a  succession  of  con- 
crete illustrations,  one  illustration  may  be  as 
effective  as  another,  and  we  get  the  whole  of  the 
Emersonian  philosophy  in  every  paragraph,  al- 
most in  every  sentence.  Each  sentence  or  each 
paragraph  is  essentially  complete  in  itself,  and  we 
may  begin  reading  at  any  point  and  continue  to 
any  point,  yet  cover  our  subject  completely  as 
far  as  we  go.  The  essay  on  "  Self-Reliance  "  has 
been  selected  because  the  general  subject  is  so 
practical  and  so  personal;  and  when  Emerson 
felt  that  he  was  making  himself  useful  to  his 
hearers  he  was  at  his  best. 

Emerson  uses  very  short  sentences  that  seem 
more  or  less  abrupt.  This  is  due  apparently  to 
his  habit  of  thought  and  his  desire  to  express 
himself  in  the  simplest  possible  way.  Certainly 
he  makes  no  such  rhetorical  use  of  the  short  sen- 
tence as  the  later  "  epigrammatic  writers  " ;  e.  g., 
Stephen  Crane  in  "  The  Red  Badge  of  Courage." 


240  Best  English  Essays 


SELF-RELIANCE 

"  Ne  te  qujesiveris  extra." 

"  MAN  is  his  own  star ;  and  the  soul  that  can 
Render  an  honest  and  a  perfect  man, 
Commands  all  light,  all  influence,  all  fate ; 
Nothing  to  him  falls  early  or  too  late. 
Our  acts  our  angels  are,  or  good  or  ill, 
Our  fatal  shadows  that  walk  by  us  still." 
Epilogue  to  Beaumont  and  Fletcher's  " Honest  Man's  Fortunes" 

CAST  the  bantling  on  the  rocks, 
Suckle  him  with  the  she-wolf's  teat ; 
'  Wintered  with  the  hawk  and  fox, 
Power  and  speed  be  hands  and  feet. 

I  READ  the  other  day  some  verses  written  by  an 
eminent  painter  which  were  original  and  not 
conventional.  The  soul  always  hears  an  admonition 
in  such  lines,  let  the  subject  be  what  it  may.  The 
sentiment  they  instil  is  of  more  value  than  any 
thought  they  may  contain.  To  believe  your  own 
thought,  to  believe  that  what  is  true  for  you  in  your 
private  heart  is  true  for  all  men,  —  that  is  genius. 
Speak  your  latent  conviction,  and  it  shall  be  the 
universal  sense ;  for  the  inmost  in  due  time  becomes 
the  outmost,  —  and  our  first  thought  is  rendered 
back  to  us  by  the  trumpets  of  the  Last  Judgment. 
Familiar  as  the  voice  of  the  mind  is  to  each,  the 
highest  merit  we  ascribe  to  Moses,  Plato,  and  Mil- 
ton is,  that  they  set  at  naught  books  and  traditions, 
and  spoke  not  what  men  but  what  they  thought. 
A  man  should  learn  to  detect  and  watch  that  gleam 
of  light  which  flashes  across  his  mind  from  within, 
more  than  the  lustre  of  the  firmament  of  bards  and 


Emerson  241 

sages.  Yet  he  dismisses  without  notice  his  thought, 
because  it  is  his.  In  every  work  of  genius  we 
recognize  our  own  rejected  thoughts:  they  come 
back  to  us  with  a  certain  alienated  majesty.  Great 
works  of  art  have  no  more  affecting  lesson  for  us 
than  this.  They  teach  us  to  abide  by  our  spon- 
taneous impression  with  good-humored  inflexibility 
then  most  when  the  whole  cry  of  voices  is  on  the 
other  side.  Else,  to-morrow  a  stranger  will  say 
with  masterly  good  sense  precisely  what  we  have 
thought  and  felt  all  the  time,  and  we  shall  be  forced 
to  take  with  shame  our  own  opinion  from  another. 
There  is  a  time  in  every  man's  education  when 
he  arrives  at  the  conviction  that  envy  is  ignorance ; 
that  imitation  is  suicide ;  that  he  must  take  himself 
for  better,  for  worse,  as  his  portion;  that  though 
the  wide  universe  is  full  of  good,  no  kernel  of 
nourishing  corn  can  come  to  him  but  through  his 
toil  bestowed  on  that  plot  of  ground  which  is  given 
to  him  to  till.  The  power  which  resides  in  him  is 
new  in  nature,  and  none  but  he  knows  what  that 
is  which  he  can  do,  nor  does  he  know  until  he  has 
tried.  Not  for  nothing  one  face,  one  character,  one 
fact,  makes  much  impression  on  him,  and  another 
none.  This  sculpture  in  the  memory  is  not  with- 
out pre-established  harmony.  The  eye  was  placed 
where  one  ray  should  fall,  that  it  might  testify  of 
that  particular  ray.  We  but  half  express  ourselves, 
and  are  ashamed  of  that  divine  idea  which  each 
of  us  represents.  It  may  be  safely  trusted  as  pro- 
portionate and  of  good  issues,  so  it  be  faithfully 
imparted,  but  God  will  not  have  his  work  made 
manifest  by  cowards.  A  man  is  relieved  and  gay 
when  he  has  put  his  heart  into  his  work  and  done 

16 


242  Best  English  Essays 

his  best;  but  what  he  has  said  or  done  otherwise, 
shall  give  him  no  peace.  It  is  a  deliverance  which 
does  not  deliver.  In  the  attempt  his  genius  deserts 
him ;  no  muse  befriends ;  no  invention,  no  hope. 

Trust  thyself:  every  heart  vibrates  to  that  iron 
string.  Accept  the'  place  the  divine  providence  has 
found  for  you,  the  society  of  your  contemporaries, 
the  connection  of  events.  Great  men  have  always 
done  so,  and  confided  themselves  childlike  to  the 
genius  of  their  age,  betraying  their  perception  that 
the  absolutely  trustworthy  was  seated  at  their  heart, 
working  through  their  hands,  predominating  in  all 
their  being.  And  we  are  now  men,  and  must  accept 
in  the  highest  mind  the  same  transcendent  destiny; 
and  not  minors  and  invalids  in  a  protected  corner, 
not  cowards  fleeing  before  a  revolution,  but  guides, 
redeemers,  and  benefactors,  obeying  the  Almighty 
effort,  and  advancing  on  Chaos  and  the  Dark. 

What  pretty  oracles  nature  yields  us  on  this  text, 
in  the  face  and  behavior  of  children,  babes,  and  even 
brutes !  That  divided  and  rebel  mind,  that  distrust 
of  a  sentiment  because  our  arithmetic  has  computed 
the  strength  and  means  opposed  to  our  purpose, 
these  have  not.  Their  mind  being  whole,  their  eye 
is  as  yet  unconquered,  and  when  we  look  in  their 
faces,  we  are  disconcerted.  Infancy  conforms  to  no- 
body :  all  conform  to  it,  so  that  one  babe  commonly 
makes  four  or  five  out  of  the  adults  who  prattle 
and  play  to  it.  So  God  has  armed  youth  and  puberty 
and  manhood  no  less  with  its  own  piquancy  and 
charm,  and  made  it  enviable  and  gracious  and  its 
claims  not  to  be  put  by,  if  it  will  stand  by  itself. 
Do  not  think  the  youth  has  no  force,  because  he 
cannot  speak  to  you  and  me.  Hark!  in  the  next 


Emerson  243 

room  his  voice  is  sufficiently  clear  and  emphatic. 
It  seems  he  knows  how  to  speak  to  his  contem- 
poraries. Bashful  or  bold,  then,  he  will  know  how 
to  make  us  seniors  very  unnecessary. 

The  nonchalance  of  boys  who  are  sure  of  a  dinner, 
and  would  disdain  as  much  as  a  lord  to  do  or  say 
aught  to  conciliate  one,  is  the  healthy  attitude  of 
human  nature.  A  boy  is  in  the  parlor  what  the 
pit  is  in  the  playhouse ;  independent,  irresponsible, 
looking  out  from  his  corner  on  such  people  and  facts 
as  pass  by,  he  tries  and  sentences  them  on  their 
merits,  in  the  swift,  summary  way  of  boys,  as  good, 
bad,  interesting,  silly,  eloquent,  troublesome.  He 
cumbers  himself  never  about  consequences,  about 
interests ;  he  gives  an  independent,  genuine  verdict. 
You  must  court  him :  he  does  not  court  you.  But 
the  man  is,  as  it  were,  clapped  into  jail  by  his 
consciousness.  As  soon  as  he  has  once  acted  or 
spoken  with  eclat,  he  is  a  committed  person,  watched 
by  the  sympathy  or  the  hatred  of  hundreds,  whose 
affections  must  now  enter  into  his  account.  There 
is  no  Lethe  for  this.  Ah,  that  he  could  pass  again 
into  his  neutrality !  Who  can  thus  avoid  all  pledges, 
and  having  observed,  observe  again  from  the  same 
unaffected,  unbiassed,  unbribable,  unaffrighted  inno- 
cence, must  always  be  formidable.  He  would  utter 
opinions  on  all  passing  affairs,  which  being  seen 
to  be  not  private,  but  necessary,  would  sink  like 
darts  into  the  ear  of  men,  and  put  them  in  fear. 

These  are  the  voices  which  we  hear  in  solitude, 
but  they  grow  faint  and  inaudible  as  we  enter  into 
the  world.  Society  everywhere  is  in  conspiracy 
against  the  manhood  of  every  one  of  its  members. 
Society  is  a  joint-stock  company,  in  which  the  mem- 


244  Best  English  Essays 

bers  agree,  for  the  better  securing  of  his  bread  to 
each  shareholder,  to  surrender  the  liberty  and  cul- 
ture of  the  eater.  The  virtue  in  most  request  is 
conformity.  Self-reliance  is  its  aversion.  It  loves 
not  realities  and  creators,  but  names  and  customs. 

Whoso  would  be  a  man  must  be  a  nonconformist. 
He  who  would  gather  immortal  palms  must  not  be 
hindered  by  the  name  of  goodness,  but  must  explore 
if  it  be  goodness.  Nothing  is  at  last  sacred  but  the 
integrity  of  your  own  mind.  Absolve  you  to  your- 
self, and  you  shall  have  the  suffrage  of  the  world.  I 
remember  an  answer  which  when  quite  young  I  was 
prompted  to  make  to  a  valued  adviser,  who  was 
wont  to  importune  me  with  the  dear  old  doctrines 
of  the  church.  On  my  saying,  What  have  I  to  do 
with  the  sacredness  of  traditions,  if  I  live  wholly 
from  within  ?  my  friend  suggested :  "  But  these 
impulses  may  be  from  below,  not  from  above."  I 
replied :  "  They  do  not  seem  to  me  to  be  such ;  but 
if  I  am  the  Devil's  child,  I  will  live  then  from  the 
Devil."  No  law  can  be  sacred  to  me  but  that  of 
my  nature.  Good  and  bad  are  but  names  very 
readily  transferable  to  that  or  this;  the  only  right 
is  what  is  after  my  constitution,  the  only  wrong 
what  is  against  it.  A  man  is  to  carry  himself  in  the 
presence  of  all  opposition,  as  if  everything  were  titu- 
lar and  ephemeral  but  him.  I  am  ashamed  to  think 
how  easily  we  capitulate  to  badges  and  names,  to 
large  societies  and  dead  institutions.  Every  decent 
and  well-spoken  individual  affects  and  sways  me 
more  than  is  right.  I  ought  to  go  upright  and 
vital,  and  speak  the  rude  truth  in  all  ways.  If 
malice  and  vanity  wear  the  coat  of  philanthropy, 
shall  that  pass?  If  an  angry  bigot  assumes  this 


Emerson 

bountiful  cause  of  Abolition,  and  comes  to  me  with 
his  last  news  from  Barbadoes,  why  should  I  not 
say  to  him :  "  Go  love  thy  infant ;  love  thy  wood- 
chopper  :  be  good-natured  and  modest :  have  that 
grace;  and  never  varnish  your  hard,  uncharitable 
ambition  with  this  incredible  tenderness  for  black 
folk  a  thousand  miles  off.  Thy  love  afar  is  spite 
at  home."  Rough  and  graceless  would  be  such 
greeting,  but  truth  is  handsomer  than  the  affectation 
of  love.  Your  goodness  must  have  some  edge  to  it, 

—  else  it  is  none.     The  doctrine  of  hatred  must  be 
preached  as  the  counteraction  of  the  doctrine  of 
love  when  that  pules  and  whines.     I  shun  father 
and  mother  and  wife  and  brother,  when  my  genius 
calls  me.     I  would  write  on  the  lintels  of  the  door- 
post,   Whim.     I  hope  it  is  somewhat  better  than 
whim  at  last,  but  we  cannot  spend  the  day  in  ex- 
planation.    Expect  me  not  to  show  cause  why  I 
seek  or  why  I  exclude  company.     Then,  again,  do 
not  tell  me,  as  a  good  man  did  to-day,  of  my  obli- 
gation to  put  all  poor  men  in  good  situations.    Are 
they  my  poor?     I  tell  thee,  thou  foolish  philan- 
thropist,  that  I  grudge  the  dollar,  the  dime,  the 
cent,  I  give  to  such  men  as  do  not  belong  to  me 
and  to  whom  I  do  not  belong.    There  is  a  class  of 
persons  to  whom  by  all  spiritual  affinity  I  am  bought 
and  sold ;   for  them  I  will  go  to  prison,  if  need  be ; 
but  your  miscellaneous  popular  charities ;   the  edu- 
cation at  college  of  fools ;   the  building  of  meeting- 
houses to  the  vain  end  to  which  many  now  stand ; 
alms  to  sots ;  and  the  thousand-fold  Relief  Societies  ; 

—  though  I  confess  with  shame  I  sometimes  suc- 
cumb and  give  the  dollar,  it  is  a  wicked  dollar  which 
by  and  by  I  shall  have  the  manhood  to  withhold. 


246  Best  English  Essays 

Virtues  are,  in  the  popular  estimate,  rather  the 
exception  than  the  rule.  There  is  the  man  and  his 
virtues.  Men  do  what  is  called  a  good  action,  as- 
some  piece  of  courage  or  charity,  much  as  they 
would  pay  a  fine  in  expiation  of  daily  non-appear- 
ance on  parade.  Their  works  are  done  as  an  apol- 
ogy or  extenuation  of  their  living  in  the  world,  — 
as  invalids  and  the  insane  pay  a  high  board.  Their 
virtues  are  penances.  I  do  not  wish  to  expiate,  but 
to  live.  My  life  is  for  itself  and  not  for  a  spectacle. 
I  much  prefer  that  it  should  be  of  a  lower  strain,  so 
it  be  genuine  and  equal,  than  that  it  should  be  glit- 
tering and  unsteady.  I  wish  it  to  be  sound  and 
sweet,  and  not  to  need  diet  and  bleeding.  I  ask 
primary  evidence  that  you  are  a  man,  and  refuse 
this  appeal  from  the  man  to  his  actions.  I  know 
that  for  myself  it  makes  no  difference  whether  I  do 
or  forbear  those  actions  which  are  reckoned  excel- 
lent. I  cannot  consent  to  pay  for  a  privilege  where 
I  have  intrinsic  right.  Few  and  mean  as  my  gifts 
may  be,  I  actually  am,  and  do  not  need  for  my 
own  assurance  or  the  assurance  of  my  fellows  any 
secondary  testimony. 

What  I  must  do  is  all  that  concerns  me,  not  what 
the  people  think.  This  rule,  equally  arduous  in 
actual  and  in  intellectual  life,  may  serve  for  the 
whole  distinction  between  greatness  and  meanness. 
It  is  the  harder,  because  you  will  always  find  those 
who  think  they  know  what  is  your  duty  better  than 
you  know  it.  It  is  easy  in  the  world  to  live  after  the 
world's  opinion ;  it  is  easy  in  solitude  to  live  after 
our  own ;  but  the  great  man  is  he  who  in  the  midst 
of  the  crowd  keeps  with  perfect  sweetness  the  in- 
dependence of  solitude. 


Emerson  247 

The  objection  to  conforming  to  usages  that  have 
become  dead  to  you  is,  that  it  scatters  your  force. 
It  loses  your  time  and  blurs  the  impression  of  your 
character.  If  you  maintain  a  dead  church,  contrib- 
ute to  a  dead  Bible  society,  vote  with  a  great  party 
either  for  the  government  or  against  it,  spread  your 
table  like  base  housekeepers,  —  under  all  these 
screens  I  have  difficulty  to  detect  the  precise  man 
you  are.  And,  of  course,  so  much  force  is  with- 
drawn from  your  proper  life.  But  do  your  work, 
and  I  shall  know  you.  Do  your  work,  and  you  shall 
reinforce  yourself.  A  man  must  consider  what  a 
blind-man's-buff  is  this  game  of  conformity.  If  I 
know  your  sect,  I  anticipate  your  argument.  I  hear 
a  preacher  announce  for  his  text  and  topic  the  ex- 
pediency of  one  of  the  institutions  of  his  church. 
Do  I  not  know  beforehand  that  not  possibly  can  he 
say  a  new  and  spontaneous  word?  Do  I  not  know 
that,  with  all  this  ostentation  of  examining  the 
grounds  of  the  institution,  he  will  do  no  such  thing? 
Do  I  not  know  that  he  is  pledged  to  himself  not  to 
look  but  at  one  side,  —  the  permitted  side,  not  as  a 
man,  but  as  a  parish  minister?  He  is  a  retained 
attorney,  and  these  airs  of  the  bench  are  the  emptiest 
affectation.  Well,  most  men  have  bound  their  eyes 
with  one  or  another  handkerchief,  and  attached 
themselves  to  some  one  of  these  communities  of 
opinion.  This  conformity  makes  them  not  false  in 
a  few  particulars,  authors  of  a  few  lies,  but  false  in 
all  particulars.  Their  every  truth  is  not  quite  true. 
Their  two  is  not  the  real  two,  their  four  not  the  real 
four ;  so  that  every  word  they  say  chagrins  us,  and 
we  know  not  where  to  begin  to  set  them  right. 
Meantime  nature  is  not  slow  to  equip  us  in  the 


248  Best  English  Essays 

prison-uniform  of  the  party  to  which  we  adhere. 
We  come  to  wear  one  cut  of  face  and  figure,  and 
acquire  by  degrees  the  gentlest  asinine  expression. 
There  is  a  mortifying  experience  in  particular, 
which  does  not  fail  to  wreak  itself  also  in  the  gen- 
eral history ;  I  mean  "  the  foolish  face  of  praise," 
the  forced  smile  which  we  put  on  in  company  where 
we  do  not  feel  at  ease  in  answer  to  conversation 
which  does  not  interest  us.  The  muscles,  not  spon- 
taneously moved,  but  moved  by  a  low  usurping  wil- 
fulness,  grow  tight  about  the  outline  of  the  face 
with  the  most  disagreeable  sensation. 

For  non-conformity  the  world  whips  you  with 
its  displeasure.  And  therefore  a  man  must  know 
how  to  estimate  a  sour  face.  The  bystanders  look 
askance  on  him  in  the  public  street  or  in  the  friend's 
parlor.  If  this  aversation  had  its  origin  in  con- 
tempt and  resistance  like  his  own,  he  might  well  go 
home  with  a  sad  countenance ;  but  the  sour  faces 
of  the  multitude,  like  their  sweet  faces,  have  no  deep 
cause,  but  are  put  on  and  off  as  the  wind  blows  and 
a  newspaper  directs.  Yet  is  the  discontent  of  the 
multitude  more  formidable  than  that  of  the  senate 
and  the  college.  It  is  easy  enough  for  a  firm  man 
who  knows  the  world  to  brook  the  rage  of  the  culti- 
vated classes.  Their  rage  is  decorous  and  prudent, 
for  they  are  timid  as  being  very  vulnerable  them- 
selves. But  when  to  their  feminine  rage  the  indig- 
nation of  the  people  is  added,  when  the  ignorant  and 
the  poor  are  aroused,  when  the  unintelligent  brute 
force  that  lies  at  the  bottom  of  society  is  made  to 
growl  and  mow,  it  needs  the  habit  of  magnanimity 
and  religion  to  treat  it  godlike  as  a  trifle  of  no 
concernment. 


Emerson  249 

The  other  terror  that  scares  us  from  self-trust  is 
our  consistency;  a  reverence  for  our  past  act  or 
word,  because  the  eyes  of  others  have  no  other  data 
for  computing  our  orbit  than  our  past  acts,  and  we 
are  loath  to  disappoint  them. 

But  why  should  you  keep  your  head  over  your 
shoulder?  Why  drag  about  this  corpse  of  your 
memory,  lest  you  contradict  somewhat  you  have 
stated  in  this  or  that  public  place?  Suppose  you 
should  contradict  yourself;  what  then?  It  seems 
to  be  a  rule  of  wisdom  never  to  rely  on  your  memory 
alone,  scarcely  even  in  acts  of  pure  memory,  but  to 
bring  the  past  for  judgment  into  the  thousand-eyed 
present,  and  live  ever  in  a  new  day.  In  your  meta- 
physics you  have  denied  personality  to  the  Deity: 
yet  when  the  devout  motions  of  the  soul  come,  yield 
to  them  heart  and  life,  though  they  should  clothe 
God  with  shape  and  color.  Leave  your  theory,  as 
Joseph  his  coat  in  the  hand  of  the  harlot,  and  flee. 

A  foolish  consistency  is  the  hobgoblin  of  little 
minds,  adored  by  little  statesmen  and  philosophers 
and  divines.  With  consistency  a  great  soul  has 
simply  nothing  to  do.  He  may  as  well  concern  him- 
self with  his  shadow  on  the  wall.  Speak  what  you 
think  now  in  hard  words  and  to-morrow  speak  what 
to-morrow  thinks  in  hard  words  again,  though  it 
contradict  everything  you  said  to-day.  —  "  Ah,  so 
you  shall  be  sure  to  be  misunderstood  ?  "  —  Is  it  so 
bad,  then,  to  be  misunderstood?  Pythagoras  was 
misunderstood,  and  Socrates,  and  Jesus,  and  Luther, 
and  Copernicus,  and  Galileo,  and  Newton,  and  every 
pure  and  wise  spirit  that  ever  took  flesh.  To  be  great 
is  to  be  misunderstood. 

I  suppose  no  man  can  violate  his  nature.    All  the 


250  Best  English  Essays 

sallies  of  his  will  are  rounded  in  by  the  law  of  his 
being,  as  the  inequalities  of  Andes  and  Himmaleh 
are  insignificant  in  the  curve  of  the  sphere.  Nor 
does  it  matter  how  you  gauge  and  try  him.  A  char- 
acter is  like  an  acrostic  or  Alexandrian  stanza;  — 
read  it  forward,  backward,  or  across,  it  still  spells 
the  same  thing.  In  this  pleasing,  contrite  wood-life 
which  God  allows  me,  let  me  record  day  by  day  my 
honest  thought  without  prospect  or  retrospect,  and, 
I  cannot  doubt,  it  will  be  found  symmetrical,  though 
I  mean  it  not  and  see  it  not.  My  book  should  smell 
of  pines  and  resound  with  the  hum  of  insects.  The 
swallow  over  my  window  should  interweave  that 
thread  or  straw  he  carries  in  his  bill  into  my  web 
also.  We  pass  for  what  we  are.  Character  teaches 
above  our  wills.  Men  imagine  that  they  communi- 
cate their  virtue  or  vice  only  by  overt  actions,  and 
do  not  see  that  virtue  or  vice  emit  a  breath  every 
moment. 

There  will  be  an  agreement  in  whatever  variety 
of  actions,  so  they  be  each  honest  and  natural  in 
their  hour.  For  of  one  will,  the  actions  will  be 
harmonious,  however  unlike  they  seem.  These 
varieties  are  lost  sight  of  at  a  little  distance,  at  a 
little  height  of  thought.  One  tendency  unites  them 
all.  The  voyage  of  the  best  ship  is  a  zigzag  line 
of  a  hundred  tacks.  See  the  line  from  a  sufficient 
distance,  and  it  straightens  itself  to  the  average 
tendency.  Your  genuine  action, will  explain  itself, 
and  will  explain  your  other  genuine  actions.  Your 
conformity  explains  nothing.  Act  singly,  and  what 
you  have  already  done  singly  will  justify  you  now. 
Greatness  appeals  to  the  future.  If  I  can  be  firm 
enough  to-day  to  do  right,  and  scorn  eyes,  I  must 


Emerson  251 

have  done  so  much  right  before  as  to  defend  me 
now.  Be  it  how  it  will,  do  right  now.  Always  scorn 
appearances,  and  you  always  may.  The  force  of 
character  is  cumulative.  All  the  foregone  days  of 
virtue  work  their  health  into  this.  What  makes 
the  majesty  of  the  heroes  of  the  senate  and  the  field, 
which  so  fills  the  imagination?  The  consciousness 
of  a  train  of  great  days  and  victories  behind.  They 
shed  an  united  light  on  the  advancing  actor.  He  is 
attended  as  by  a  visible  escort  of  angels.  That  is 
it  which  throws  thunder  into  Chatham's  voice,  and 
dignity  into  Washington's  port,  and  America  into 
Adams's  eye.  Honor  is  venerable  to  us  because  it 
is  no  ephemeris.  It  is  always  ancient  virtue.  We 
worship  it  to-day  because  it  is  not  of  to-day.  We 
love  it  and  pay  it  homage,  because  it  is  not  a  trap 
for  our  love  and  homage,  but  is  self-dependent,  self- 
derived,  and  therefore  of  an  old  immaculate  pedi- 
gree, even  if  shown  in  a  young  person. 

I  hope  in  these  days  we  have  heard  the  last  of  con- 
formity and  consistency.  Let  the  words  be  gazetted 
and  ridiculous  henceforward.  Instead  of  the  gong 
for  dinner,  let  us  hear  a  whistle  from  the  Spartan 
fife.  Let  us  never  bow  and  apologize  more.  A 
great  man  is  coming  to  eat  at  my  house.  I  do  not 
wish  to  please  him ;  I  wish  that  he  should  wish  to 
please  me.  I  will  stand  here  for  humanity,  and 
though  I  would  make  it  kind,  I  would  make  it  true. 
Let  us  affront  and  reprimand  the  smooth  mediocrity 
and  squalid  contentment  of  the  times,  and  hurl  in 
the  face  of  custom,  and  trade,  and  office,  the  fact 
which  is  the  upshot  of  all  history,  that  there  is  a 
great  responsible  Thinker  and  Actor  working  wher- 
ever a  man  works ;  that  a  true  man  belongs  to  no 


252  Best  English  Essays 

other  time  or  place,  but  is  the  centre  of  things. 
Where  he  is,  there  is  nature.  He  measures  you,  and 
all  men,  and  all  events.  Ordinarily,  everybody  in 
society  reminds  us  of  somewhat  else,  or  of  some 
other  person.  Character,  reality,  reminds  you  of 
nothing  else;  it  takes  place  of  the  whole  creation. 
The  man  must  be  so  much,  that  he  must  make  all 
circumstances  indifferent.  Every  true  man  is  a 
cause,  a  country,  and  an  age ;  requires  infinite  spaces 
and  numbers  and  time  fully  to  accomplish  his  de- 
sign ;  —  and  posterity  seems  to  follow  his  steps  as 
a  train  of  clients.  A  man  Csesar  is  born,  and  for 
ages  after  we  have  a  Roman  Empire.  Christ  is 
born,  and  millions  of  minds  so  grow  and  cleave  to 
his  genius,  that  he  is  confounded  with  virtue  and 
the  possible  of  man.  An  institution  is  the  length- 
ened shadow  of  one  man ;  as  Monachism,  of  the 
Hermit  Antony;  the  Reformation,  of  Luther; 
Quakerism,  of  Fox ;  Methodism,  of  Wesley ;  Abo- 
lition, of  Clarkson.  Scipio,  Milton  called  "  the 
height  of  Rome " ;  and  all  history  resolves  itself 
very  easily  into  the  biography  of  a  few  stout  and 
earnest  persons. 

Let  a  man  then  know  his  worth,  and  keep  things 
under  his  feet.  Let  him  not  peep  or  steal,  or  skulk 
up  and  down  with  the  air  of  a  charity-boy,  a  bastard, 
or  an  interloper,  in  ihe  world  which  exists  for  him. 
But  the  man  in  the  street,  finding  no  worth  in  him- 
self which  corresponds  to  the  force  which  built  a 
tower  or  sculptured  a  marble  god,  feels  poor  when 
he  looks  on  these.  To  him  a  palace,  a  statue,  or  a 
costly  book  has  an  alien  and  forbidding  air,  much 
like  a  gay  equipage,  and  seems  to  say  like  that, 
'•'Who  are  you,  sir?"  Yet  they  all  are  his  suitors 


Emerson  253 

for  his  notice,  petitioners  to  his  faculties  that  they 
will  come  out  and  take  possession.  The  picture 
waits  for  my  verdict :  it  is  not  to  command  me,  but 
I  am  to  settle  its  claims  to  praise.  That  popular 
fable  of  the  sot  who  was  picked  up  dead  drunk  in 
the  street,  carried  to  the  duke's  house,  washed  and 
dressed  and  laid  in  the  duke's  bed,  and,  on  his  wak- 
ing, treated  with  all  obsequious  ceremony  like  the 
duke,  and  assured  that  he  had  been  insane,  owes  its 
popularity  to  the  fact,  that  it  symbolizes  so  well  the 
state  of  man,  who  is  in  the  world  a  sort  of  sot,  but 
now  and  then  wakes  up,  exercises  his  reason  and 
finds  himself  a  true  prince. 

Our  reading  is  mendicant  and  sycophantic.  In 
history,  our  imagination  plays  us  false.  Kingdom 
and  lordship,  power  and  estate,  are  a  gaudier  vocab- 
ulary than  private  John  and  Edward  in  a  small 
house  and  common  day's  work;  but  the  things  of 
life  are  the  same  to  both ;  the  sum  total  of  both  are 
the  same.  Why  all  this  deference  to  Alfred,  and 
Scanderbeg,  and  Gustavus?  Suppose  they  were 
virtuous ;  did  they  wear  out  virtue  ?  As  great  a 
stake  depends  on  your  private  act  to-day,  as  fol- 
lowed their  public  and  renowned  steps.  When  pri- 
vate men  shall  act  with  original  views,  the  lustre 
will  be  transferred  from  the  actions  of  kings  to  those 
of  gentlemen. 

The  world  has  been  instructed  by  its  kings,  who 
have  so  magnetized  the  eyes  of  nations.  It  has  been 
taught  by  this  colossal  symbol  the  mutual  reverence 
that  is  due  from  man  to  man.  The  joyful  loyalty 
with  which  men  have  everywhere  suffered  the  king, 
the  noble,  or  the  great  proprietor  to  walk  among 
them  by  a  law  of  his  own,  make  his  own  scale  of 


254  Best  English  Essays 

men  and  things  and  reverse  theirs,  pay  for  benefits 
not  with  money  but  with  honor,  and  represent  the 
law  in  his  person,  was  the  hieroglyphic  by  which 
they  obscurely  signified  their  consciousness  of  their 
own  right  and  comeliness,  the  right  of  every  man. 

The  magnetism  which  all  original  action  exerts 
is  explained  when  we  inquire  the  reason  of  self- 
trust.  Who  is  the  Trustee?  What  is  the  aborig- 
inal Self,  on  which  a  universal  reliance  may  be 
grounded?  What  is  the  nature  and  power  of  that 
science-baffling  star,  without  parallax,  without  cal- 
culable elements,  which  shoots  a  ray  of  beauty  even 
into  trivial  and  impure  actions,  if  the  least  mark 
of  independence  appear?  The  inquiry  leads  us  to 
that  source,  at  once  the  essence  of  genius,  of  virtue, 
and  of  life,  which  we  call  Spontaneity  or  Instinct. 
We  denote  this  primary  wisdom  as  Intuition,  whilst 
all  later  teachings  are  tuitions.  In  that  deep  force, 
the  last  fact  behind  which  analysis  cannot  go,  all 
things  find  their  common  origin.  For,  the  sense 
of  being  which  in  calm  hours  rises,  we  know  not 
how,  in  the  soul,  is  not  diverse  from  things,  from 
space,  from  light,  from  time,  from  man,  but  one 
with  them,  and  proceeds  obviously  from  the  same 
source  whence  their  life  and  being  also  proceed.  We 
first  share  the  life  by  which  things  exist,  and  after- 
wards see  them  as  appearances  in  nature,  and  forget 
that  we  have  shared  their  cause.  Here  is  the  foun- 
tain of  action  and  of  thought.  Here  are  the  lungs 
of  that  inspiration  which  giveth  man  wisdom,  and 
which  cannot  be  denied  without  impiety  and  athe- 
ism. We  lie  in  the  lap  of  immense  intelligence, 
which  makes  us  receivers  of  its  truth  and  organs 
of  its  activity.  When  we  discern  justice,  when  we 


Emerson  "  255 

discern  truth,  we  do  nothing  of  ourselves,  but  allow 
a  passage  to  its  beams.  If  we  ask  whence  this 
comes,  if  we  seek  to  pry  into  the  soul  that  causes,  all 
philosophy  is  at  fault.  Its  presence  or  its  absence 
is  all  we  can  affirm.  Every  man  discriminates 
between  the  voluntary  acts  of  his  mind,  and  his  in- 
voluntary perceptions,  and  knows  that  to  his  invol- 
untary perceptions  a  perfect  faith  is  due.  He  may 
err  in  the  expression  of  them,  but  he  knows  that 
these  things  are  so,  like  day  and  night,  not  to  be  dis- 
puted. My  wilful  actions  and  acquisitions  are  but 
roving ;  —  the  idlest  revery,  the  faintest  native  emo- 
tion, command  my  curiosity  and  respect.  Thought- 
less people  contradict  as  readily  the  statements  of 
perceptions  as  of  opinions,  or  rather  much  more 
readily;  for,  they  do  not  distinguish  between  per- 
ception and  notion.  They  fancy  that  I  choose  to 
see  this  or  that  thing.  But  perception  is  not  whim- 
sical, it  is  fatal.  If  I  see  a  trait,  my  children  will 
see  it  after  me,  and  in  course  of  time,  all  mankind, 
—  although  it  may  chance  that  no  one  has  seen  it 
before  me.  For  my  perception  of  it  is  as  much  a 
fact  as  the  sun. 

The  relations  of  the  soul  to  the  divine  spirit  are  so 
pure,  that  it  is  profane  to  seek  to  interpose  helps. 
It  must  be  that  when  God  speaketh  he  should  com- 
municate, not  one  thing,  but  all  things;  should  fill 
the  world  with  his  voice ;  should  scatter  forth  light, 
nature,  time,  souls,  from  the  centre  of  the  present 
thought;  and  new  date  and  new  create  the  whole. 
Whenever  a  mind  is  simple,  and  receives  a  divine 
wisdom,  old  things  pass  away,  —  means,  teachers, 
texts,  temples,  fall;  it  lives  now,  and  absorbs  past 
and  future  into  the  present  hour.  All  things  are 


256  Best  English  Essays 

made  sacred  by  relation  to  it,  —  one  as  much  as 
another.  All  things  are  dissolved  to  their  centre  by 
their  cause,  and,  in  the  universal  miracle,  petty  and 
particular  miracles  disappear.  If,  therefore,  a  man 
claims  to  know  and  speak  of  God,  and  carries  you 
backward  to  the  phraseology  of  some  old  mouldered 
nation  in  another  country,  in  another  world,  believe 
him  not.  Is  the  acorn  better  than  the  oak  which  is 
its  fulness  and  completion?  Is  the  parent  better 
than  the  child  into  whom  he  has  cast  his  ripened 
being?  Whence,  then,  this  worship  of  the  past? 
The  centuries  are  conspirators  against  the  sanity 
and  authority  of  the  soul.  Time  and  space  are  but 
physiological  colors  which  the  eye  makes,  but  the 
soul  is  light;  where  it  is,  is  day;  where  it  was,  is 
night ;  and  history  is  an  impertinence  and  an  in- 
jury, if  it  be  anything  more  than  a  cheerful  apologue 
or  parable  of  my  being  and  becoming. 

Man  is  timid  and  apologetic;  he  is  no  longer 
upright ;  he  dares  not  say,  "  I  think,"  "  I  am,"  but 
quotes  some  saint  or  sage.  He  is  ashamed  before 
the  blade  of  grass  or  the  blowing  rose.  These  roses 
under  my  window  make  no  reference  to  former 
roses  or  to  better  ones ;  they  are  for  what  they  are ; 
they  exist  with  God  to-day.  There  is  no  time  to 
them.  There  is  simply  the  rose;  it  is  perfect  in 
every  moment  of  its  existence.  Before  a  leaf-bud 
has  burst,  its  whole  life  acts ;  in  the  full-blown 
flower  there  is  no  more ;  in  the  leafless  root  there  is 
no  less.  Its  nature  is  satisfied,  and  it  satisfies  nature, 
in  all  moments  alike.  But  man  postpones  or  remem- 
bers ;  he  does  not  live  in  the  present,  but  with 
reverted  eye  laments  the  past,  or,  heedless  of  the 
riches  that  surround  him,  stands  on  tiptoe  to  fore- 


Emerson  257 

see  the  future.  He  cannot  be  happy  and  strong  until 
he  too  lives  with  nature  in  the  present,  above  time. 

This  should  be  plain  enough.  Yet  see  what 
strong  intellects  dare  not  yet  hear  God  himself, 
unless  he  speak  the  phraseology  of  I  know  not  what 
David,  or  Jeremiah,  or  Paul.  We  shall  not  always 
set  so  great  a  price  on  a  few  texts,  on  a  few  lives. 
We  are  like  children  who  repeat  by  rote  the  sen- 
tences of  grandames  and  tutors,  and,  as  they  grow 
older,  of  the  men  of  talents  and  character  they 
chance  to  see,  —  painfully  recollecting  the  exact 
words  they  spoke ;  afterwards,  when  they  come  into 
the  point  of  view  which  those  had  who  uttered  these 
sayings,  they  understand  them,  and  are  willing  to 
let  the  words  go ;  for,  at  any  time,  they  can  use 
words  as  good  when  occasion  comes.  If  we  live 
truly,  we  shall  see  truly.  It  is  as  easy  for  the  strong 
man  to  be  strong,  as  it  is  for  the  weak  to  be  weak. 
When  we  have  new  perception,  we  shall  gladly  dis- 
burden the  memory  of  its  hoarded  treasures  as  old 
rubbish.  When  a  man  lives  with  God,  his  voice 
shall  be  as  sweet  as  the  murmur  of  the  brook  and  the 
rustle  of  the  corn. 

And  now  at  last  the  highest  truth  on  this  subject 
remains  unsaid;  probably  cannot  be  said;  for  all 
that  we  say  is  the  far-off  remembering  of  the  intu- 
ition. That  thought,  by  what  I  can  now  nearest 
approach  to  say  it,  is  this.  When  good  is  near  you, 
when  you  have  life  in  yourself,  it  is  not  by  any 
known  or  accustomed  way;  you  shall  not  discern 
the  footprints  of  any  other;  you  shall  not  see  the 
face  of  man  ;  you  shall  not  hear  any  name ;  the  way, 
the  thought,  the  good,  shall  be  wholly  strange  and 
new.  It  shall  exclude  example  and  experience. 

17 


258  Best  English  Essays 

You  take  the  way  from  man,  not  to  man.  All  per- 
sons that  ever  existed  are  its  forgotten  ministers. 
Fear  and  hope  are  alike  beneath  it.  There  is  some- 
what low  even  in  hope.  In  the  hour  of  vision,  there 
is  nothing  that  can  be  called  gratitude,  nor  properly 
joy.  The  soul  raised  over  passion  beholds  identity 
and  eternal  causation,  perceives  the  self-existence 
of  Truth  and  Right,  and  calms  itself  with  knowing 
that  all  things  go  well.  Vast  spaces  of  nature,  the 
Atlantic  Ocean,  the  South  Sea,  —  long  intervals  of 
time,  years,  centuries,  —  are  of  no  account.  This 
which  I  think  and  feel  underlay  every  former  state 
of  life  and  circumstances,  as  it  does  underlie  my 
present,  and  what  is  called  life,  and  what  is  called 
death. 

Life  only  avails,  not  the  having  lived.  Power 
ceases  in  the  instant  of  repose;  it  resides  in  the 
moment  of  transition  from  a  past  to  a  new  state,  in 
the  shooting  of  the  gulf,  in  the  darting  to  an  aim. 
This  one  fact  the  world  hates,  that  the  soul  becomes; 
for  that  forever  degrades  the  past,  turns  all  riches 
to  poverty,  all  reputation  to  a  shame,  confounds 
the  saint  with  the  rogue,  shoves  Jesus  and  Judas 
equally  aside.  Why,  then,  do  we  prate  of  self- 
reliance?  Inasmuch  as  the  soul  is  present,  there 
will  be  power  not  confident  but  agent.  To  talk  of 
reliance  is  a  poor  external  way  of  speaking.  Speak 
rather  of  that  which  relies,  because  it  works  and  is. 
Who  has  more  obedience  than  I  masters  me,  though 
he  should  not  raise  his  finger.  Round  him  I  must 
revolve  by  the  gravitation  of  spirits.  We  fancy  it 
rhetoric,  when  we  speak  of  eminent  virtue.  We  do 
not  yet  see  that  virtue  is  Height,  and  that  a  man  or 
a  company  of  men,  plastic  and  permeable  to  prin- 


Emerson  259 

ciples,  by  the  law  of  nature  must  overpower  and  ride 
all  cities,  nations,  kings,  rich  men,  poets,  who  are 
not. 

This  is  the  ultimate  fact  which  we  so  quickly 
reach  on  this,  as  on  every  topic,  the  resolution  of 
all  into  the  ever-blessed  ONE.  Self-existence  is  the 
attribute  of  the  Supreme  Cause,  and  it  constitutes 
the  measure  of  good  by  the  degree  in  which  it  enters 
into  all  lower  forms.  All  things  real  are  so  by 
so  much  virtue  as  they  contain.  Commerce,  hus- 
bandry, hunting,  whaling,  war,  eloquence,  personal 
weight,  are  somewhat,  and  engage  my  respect  as 
examples  of  its  presence  and  impure  action.  I  see 
the  same  law  working  in  nature  for  conservation 
and  growth.  Power  is  in  nature  the  essential  meas- 
ure of  right.  Nature  suffers  nothing  to  remain  in 
her  kingdoms  which  cannot  help  itself.  The  genesis 
and  maturation  of  a  planet,  its  poise  and  orbit,  the 
bended  tree  recovering  itself  from  the  strong  wind, 
the  vital  resources  of  every  animal  and  vegetable, 
are  demonstrations  of  the  self-sufficing,  and  there- 
fore self-relying  soul. 

Thus  all  concentrates :  let  us  not  rove ;  let  us  sit 
at  home  with  the  cause.  Let  us  stun  and  astonish 
the  intruding  rabble  of  men  and  books  and  institu- 
tions, by  a  simple  declaration  of  the  divine  fact.  Bid 
the  invaders  take  the  shoes  from  off  their  feet,  for 
God  is  here  within.  Let  our  simplicity  judge  them, 
and  our  docility  to  our  own  law  demonstrate  the 
poverty  of  nature  and  fortune  beside  our  native 
riches. 

But  now  we  are  a  mob.  Man  does  not  stand  in 
awe  of  man,  nor  is  his  genius  admonished  to  stay  at 
home,  to  put  itself  in  communication  with  the  inter- 


260  Best  English  Essays 

nal  ocean,  but  it  goes  abroad  to  beg  a  cup  of  water 
of  the  urns  of  other  men.  We  must  go  alone.  I 
like  the  silent  church  before  the  service  begins, 
better  than  any  preaching.  How  far  off,  how  cool, 
how  chaste  the  persons  look,  begirt  each  one  with 
a  precinct  or  sanctuary !  So  let  us  always  sit.  Why 
should  we  assume  the  faults  of  our  friend,  or  wife, 
or  father,  or  child,  because  they  sit  around  our 
hearth,  or  are  said  to  have  the  same  blood?  All 
men  have  my  blood,  and  I  have  all  men's.  Not  for 
that  will  I  adopt  their  petulance  or  folly,  even  to 
the  extent  of  being  ashamed  of  it.  But  the  isolation 
must  not  be  mechanical,  but  spiritual,  that  is,  must 
be  elevation.  At  times  the  whole  world  seems  to  be 
in  conspiracy  to  importune  you  with  emphatic  trifles. 
Friend,  client,  child,  sickness,  fear,  want,  charity,  all 
knock  at  once  at  thy  closet  door,  and  say,  "  Come 
out  unto  us."  But  keep  thy  state;  come  not  into 
their  confusion.  The  power  men  possess  to  annoy 
me,  I  give  them  by  a  weak  curiosity.  No  man  can 
come  near  me  but  through  my  act.  "  What  we  love 
that  we  have,  but  by  desire  we  bereave  ourselves  of 
the  love." 

If  we  cannot  at  once  rise  to  the  sanctities  of  obe- 
dience and  faith,  let  us  at  least  resist  our  tempta- 
tions ;  let  us  enter  into  the  state  of  war,  and  wake 
Thor  and  Woden,  courage  and  constancy  in  our 
Saxon  breasts.  This  is  to  be  done  in  our  smooth 
times  by  speaking  the  truth.  Check  this  lying 
hospitality  and  lying  affection.  Live  no  longer  to 
the  expectation  of  these  deceived  and  deceiving 
people  with  whom  we  converse.  Say  to  them,  O 
father,  O  mother,  O  wife,  O  brother,  O  friend,  I 
have  lived  with  you  after  appearances  hitherto. 


Emerson  261 

Henceforward  I  am  the  truth's.  Be  it  known  unto 
you  that  henceforward  I  obey  no  law  less  than  the 
eternal  law.  I  will  have  no  covenants  but  proxim- 
ities. I  shall  endeavor  to  nourish  my  parents,  to 
support  my  family,  to  be  the  chaste  husband  of  one 
wife,  —  but  these  relations  I  must  fill  after  a  new 
and  unprecedented  way.  I  appeal  from  your  cus- 
toms. I  must  be  myself.  I  cannot  break  myself 
any  longer  for  you,  or  you.  If  you  can  love  me  for 
what  I  am,  we  shall  be  the  happier.  If  you  cannot, 
I  will  still  seek  to  deserve  that  you  should.  I  will 
not  hide  my  tastes  or  aversions.  I  will  so  trust  that 
what  is  deep  is  holy,  that  I  will  do  strongly  before 
the  sun  and  moon  whatever  inly  rejoices  me,  and  the 
heart  appoints.  If  you  are  noble,  I  will  love  you; 
if  you  are  not,  I  will  not  hurt  you  and  myself  by 
hypocritical  attentions.  If  you  are  true,  but  not 
in  the  same  truth  with  me,  cleave  to  your  compan- 
ions ;  I  will  seek  my  own.  I  do  this  not  selfishly, 
but  humbly  and  truly.  It  is  alike  your  interest,  and 
mine,  and  all  men's,  however  long  we  have  dwelt 
in  lies,  to  live  in  truth.  Does  this  sound  harsh  to- 
day? You  will  soon  love  what  is  dictated  by  your 
nature  as  well  as  mine,  and,  if  we  follow  the  truth, 
it  will  bring  us  out  safe  at  last.  But  so  you  may 
give  these  friends  pain.  Yes,  but  I  cannot  sell  my 
liberty  and  my  power,  to  save  their  sensibility.  Be- 
sides, all  persons  have  their  moments  of  reason,  when 
they  look  out  into  the  region  of  absolute  truth ;  then 
will  they  justify  me,  and  do  the  same  thing. 

The  populace  think  that  your  rejection  of  popular 
standards  is  a  rejection  of  all  standard,  and  mere 
antinomianism ;  and  the  bold  sensualist  will  use  the 
name  of  philosophy  to  gild  his  crimes.  But  the  law 


262  Best  English  Essays 

of  consciousness  abides.  There  are  two  confes- 
sionals, in  one  or  the  other  of  which  we  must  be 
shriven.  You  may  fulfil  your  round  of  duties  by 
clearing  yourself  in  the  direct,  or  in  the' reflex  way. 
Consider  whether  you  have  satisfied  your  relations 
to  father,  mother,  cousin,  neighbor,  town,  cat,  and 
dog;  whether  any  of  these  can  upbraid  you.  But 
I  may  also  neglect  this  reflex  standard,  and  absolve 
me  to  myself.  I  have  my  own  stern  claims  and 
perfect  circle.  It  denies  the  name  of  duty  to  many 
offices  that  are  called  duties.  But  if  I  can  dis- 
charge its  debts,  it  enables  me  to  dispense  with  the 
popular  code.  If  any  one  imagines  that  this  law  is 
lax,  let  him  keep  its  commandment  one  day. 

And  truly  it  demands  something  godlike  in  him 
who  has  cast  off  the  common  motives  of  humanity, 
and  has  ventured  to  trust  himself  for  a  taskmaster. 
High  be  his  heart,  faithful  his  will,  clear  his  sight, 
that  he  may  in  good  earnest  be  doctrine,  society, 
law,  to  himself,  that  a  simple  purpose  may  be  to 
him  as  strong  as  iron  necessity  is  to  others ! 

If  any  man  consider  the  present  aspects  of  what  is 
called  by  distinction  society,  he  will  see  the  need  of 
these  ethics.  The  sinew  and  heart  of  man  seem  to 
be  drawn  out,  and  we  are  become  timorous,  despond- 
ing whimperers.  We  are  afraid  of  truth,  afraid  of 
fortune,  afraid  of  death,  and  afraid  of  each  other. 
Our  age  yields  no  great  and  perfect  persons.  We 
want  men  and  women  who  shall  renovate  life  and 
our  social  state,  but  we  see  that  most  natures  are 
insolvent,  cannot  satisfy  their  own  wants,  have  an 
ambition  out  of  all  proportion  to  their  practical 
force,  and  do  lean  and  beg  day  and  night  continu- 
ally. Our  housekeeping  is  mendicant,  our  arts,  our 


Emerson  263 

occupations,  our  marriages,  our  religion,  we  have 
not  chosen,  but  society  has  chosen  for  us.  We  are 
parlor  soldiers.  We  shun  the  rugged  battle  of  fate, 
where  strength  is  born. 

If  our  young  men  miscarry  in  their  first  enter- 
prises, they  lose  all  heart.  If  the  young  merchant 
fails,  men  say  he  is  ruined.  If  the  finest  genius 
studies  at  one  of  our  colleges,  and  is  not  installed 
in  an  office  within  one  year  afterwards  in  the  cities 
or  suburbs  of  Boston  or  New  York,  it  seems  to  his 
friends  and  to  himself  that  he  is  right  in  being 
disheartened,  and  in  complaining  the  rest  of  his 
life.  A  sturdy  lad  from  New  Hampshire  or  Ver- 
mont, who  in  turn  tries  all  the  professions,  who 
teams  it,  farms  it,  peddles,  keeps  a  school,  preaches, 
edits  a  newspaper,  goes  to  Congress,  buys  a  town- 
ship, and  so  forth,  in  successive  years,  and  always, 
like  a  cat,  falls  on  his  feet,  is  worth  a  hundred  of 
these  city  dolls.  He  walks  abreast  with  his  days, 
and  feels  no  shame  in  not  "  studying  a  profession," 
for  he  does  not  postpone  his  life,  but  lives  already. 
He  has  not  one  chance,  but  a  hundred  chances. 
Let  a  Stoic  open  the  resources  of  man,  and  tell 
men  they  are  not  leaning  willows,  but  can  and  must 
detach  themselves ;  that  with  the  exercise  of  self- 
trust,  new  powers  shall  appear;  that  a  man  is  the 
word  made  flesh,  born  to  shed  healing  to  the  nations, 
that  he  should  be  ashamed  of  our  compassion,  and 
that  the  moment  he  acts  from  himself,  tossing  the 
laws,  the  books,  idolatries,  and  customs  out  of  the 
window,  we  pity  him  no  more,  but  thank  and  revere 
him,  —  and  that  teacher  shall  restore  the  life  of 
man  to  splendor,  and  make  his  name  dear  to  all 
history. 


264  Best  English  Essays 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  a  greater  self-reliance  must 
work  a  revolution  in  all  the  offices  and  relations  of 
men ;  in  their  religion  ;  in  their  education  ;  in  their 
pursuits ;  their  modes  of  living ;  their  association ; 
in  their  property ;  in  their  speculative  views. 

i.  In  what  prayers  do  men  allow  themselves! 
That  which  they  call  a  holy  office  is  not  so  much 
as  brave  and  manly.  Prayer  looks  abroad  and  asks 
for  some  foreign  addition  to  come  through  some 
foreign  virtue,  and  loses  itself  in  endless  mazes  of 
natural  and  supernatural,  and  mediatorial  and 
miraculous.  Prayer  that  craves  a  particular  com- 
modity, —  anything  less  than  all  good,  —  is  vicious. 
Prayer  is  the  contemplation  of  the  facts  of  life  from 
the  highest  point  of  view.  It  is  the  soliloquy  of  a 
beholding  and  jubilant  soul.  It  is  the  spirit  of  God 
pronouncing  his  works  good.  But  prayer  as  a 
means  to  effect  a  private  end  is  meanness  and 
theft.  It  supposes  dualism  and  not  unity  in  nature 
and  consciousness.  As  soon  as  the  man  is  at  one 
with  God,  he  will  not  beg.  He  will  then  see  prayer 
in  all  action.  The  prayer  of  the  farmer  kneeling 
in  his  field  to  weed  it,  the  prayer  of  the  rower 
kneeling  with  the  stroke  of  his  oar,  are  true  prayers 
heard  throughout  nature  though  for  cheap  ends. 
Caratach,  in  Fletcher's  "  Bonduca,"  when  admon- 
ished to  inquire  the  mind  of  the  god  Audate, 
replies,  — 

"His  hidden  meaning  lies  in  our  endeavors; 
Our  valors  are  our  best  gods." 

Another  sort  of  false  prayers  are  our  regrets. 
Discontent  is  the  want  of  self-reliance:  it  is 
infirmity  of  will.  Regret  calamities,  if  you  can 


Emerson  265 

thereby  help  the  sufferer:  if  not,  attend  your  own 
work,  and  already  the  evil  begins  to  be  repaired. 
Our  sympathy  is  just  as  base.  We  come  to  them 
who  weep  foolishly,  and  sit  down  and  cry  for  com- 
pany, instead  of  imparting  to  them  truth  and  health 
in  rough  electric  shocks,  putting  them  once  more  in 
communication  with  their  own  reason.  The  secret 
of  fortune  is  joy  in  our  hands.  Welcome  evermore 
to  gods  and  men  is  the  self-helping  man.  For  him 
all  doors  are  flung  wide:  him  all  tongues  greet, 
all  honors  crown,  all  eyes  follow  with  desire.  Our 
love  goes  out  to  him  and  embraces  him,  because  he 
did  not  need  it.  We  solicitously  and  apologetically 
caress  and  celebrate  him,  because  he  held  on  his 
way  and  scorned  our  disapprobation.  The  gods 
love  him  because  men  hated  him.  "  To  the  per- 
severing mortal,"  said  Zoroaster,  "  the  blessed 
Immortals  are  swift." 

As  men's  prayers  are  a  disease  of  the  will,  so  are 
their  creeds  a  disease  of  the  intellect.  They  say 
with  those  foolish  Israelites,  "  Let  not  God  speak  to 
us  lest  we  die.  Speak  thou,  speak  any  man  with  us, 
and  we  will  obey."  Everywhere  I  am  hindered  of 
meeting  God  in  my  brother,  because  he  has  shut  his 
own  temple  doors,  and  recites  fables  merely  of  his 
brother's  or  his  brother's  brother's  God.  Every  new 
mind  is  a  new  classification.  If  it  prove  a  mind  of 
uncommon  activity  and  power,  a  Locke,  a  Lavoisier, 
a  Hutton,  a  Bentham,  a  Fourier,  it  imposes  its 
classification  on  other  men,  and  lo!  a  new  system. 
In  proportion  to  the  depth  of  the  thought,  and  so 
to  the  number  of  the  objects  it  touches  and  brings 
within  reach  of  the  pupil,  is  his  complacency.  But 
chiefly  is  this  apparent  in  creeds  and  churches, 


266  Best  English  Essays 

which  are  also  classifications  of  some  powerful  mind 
acting  on  the  elemental  thought  of  duty,  and  man's 
relation  to  the  Highest.  Such  is  Calvinism,  Quak- 
erism, Swedenborgism.  The  pupil  takes  the  same 
delight  in  subordinating  everything  to  the  new  ter- 
minology, as  a  girl  who  has  just  learned  botany 
in  seeing  a  new  earth  and  new  seasons  thereby. 
It  will  happen  for  a  time,  that  the  pupil  will  find 
his  intellectual  power  has  grown  by  the  study  of 
his  master's  mind.  But  in  all  unbalanced  minds, 
the  classification  is  idolized,  passes  for  the  end,  and 
not  for  a  speedily  exhaustible  means,  so  that  the 
walls  of  the  system  blend  to  their  eye  in  the  remote 
horizon  with  the  walls  of  the  universe;  the  lumi- 
naries of  heaven  seem  to  them  hung  on  the  arch 
their  master  built.  They  cannot  imagine  how  you 
aliens  have  any  right  to  see,  —  how  you  can  see ; 
"  it  must  be  somehow  that  you  stole  the  light  from 
us."  They  do  not  yet  perceive,  that  light,  unsyste- 
matic, indomitable,  will  break  into  any  cabin,  even 
into  theirs.  Let  them  chirp  awhile  and  call  it  their 
own.  If  they  are  honest  and  do  well,  presently  their 
neat  new  pinfold  will  be  too  strait  and  low,  will 
crack,  will  lean,  will  rot  and  vanish,  and  the  im- 
mortal light,  all  young  and  joyful,  million-orbed, 
million-colored,  will  beam  over  the  universe  as  on 
the  first  morning. 

2.  It  is  for  want  of  self-culture  that  the  super- 
stition of  Travelling,  whose  idols  are  Italy,  England, 
Egypt,  retains  its  fascination  for  all  educated  Ameri- 
cans. They  who  made  England,  Italy,  or  Greece 
venerable  in  the  imagination  did  so  by  sticking  fast 
where  they  were,  like  an  axis  of  the  earth.  In 
manly  hours,  we  feel  that  duty  is  our  place.  The 


Emerson  267 

soul  is  no  traveller ;  the  wise  man  stays  at  home, 
and  when  his  necessities,  his  duties,  on  any  occasion, 
call  him  from  his  house,  or  into  foreign  lands,  he 
is  at  home  still,  and  shall  make  men  sensible  by 
the  expression  of  his  countenance,  that  he  goes  the 
missionary  of  wisdom  and  virtue,  and  visits  cities 
and  men  like  a  sovereign,  and  not  like  an  interloper 
or  a  valet. 

I  have  no  churlish  objection  to  the  circumnavi- 
gation of  the  globe,  for  the  purposes  of  art,  of 
study,  and  benevolence,  so  that  the  man  is  first 
domesticated,  or  does  not  go  abroad  with  the  hope 
of  finding  somewhat  greater  than  he  knows.  He 
who  travels  to  be  amused,  or  to  get  somewhat 
which  he  does  not  carry,  travels  away  from  himself, 
and  grows  old  even  in  youth  among  old  things. 
In  Thebes,  in  Palmyra,  his  will  and  mind  have 
become  old  and  dilapidated  as  they.  He  carries 
ruins  to  ruins. 

Travelling  is  a  fool's  paradise.  Our  first  journeys 
discover  to  us  the  indifference  of  places.  At  home 
I  dream  that  at  Naples,  at  Rome,  I  can  be  intoxi- 
cated with  beauty,  and  lose  my  sadness.  I  pack 
my  trunk,  embrace  my  friends,  embark  on  the  sea, 
and  at  last  wake  up  in  Naples,  and  there  beside  me 
is  the  stern  fact,  the  sad  self,  unrelenting,  identical, 
that  I  fled  from.  I  seek  the  Vatican,  and  the  palaces. 
I  affect  to  be  intoxicated  with  sights  and  sugges- 
tions, but  I  am  not  intoxicated.  My  giant  goes 
with  me  wherever  I  go. 

3.  But  the  rage  of  travelling  is  a  symptom  of  a 
deeper  unsoundness  affecting  the  whole  intellectual 
action.  The  intellect  is  vagabond,  and  our  system 
of  education  fosters  restlessness.  Our  minds  travel 


a68  Best  English  Essays 

when  our  bodies  are  forced  to  stay  at  home.  We 
imitate;  and  what  is  imitation  but  the  travelling  of 
the  mind  ?  Our  houses  are  built  with  foreign  taste ; 
our  shelves  are  garnished  with  foreign  ornaments ; 
our  opinions,  our  tastes,  our  faculties,  lean,  and 
follow  the  Past  and  the  Distant.  The  soul  created 
the  arts  wherever  they  have  flourished.  It  was 
in  his  own  mind  that  the  artist  sought  his  model. 
It  was  an  application  of  his  own  thought  to  the 
thing  to  be  done  and  the  conditions  to  be  observed. 
And  why  need  we  copy  the  Doric  or  the  Gothic 
model?  Beauty,  convenience,  grandeur  of  thought, 
and  quaint  expression  are  as  near  to  us  as  to  any, 
and  if  the  American  artist  will  study  with  hope  and 
love  the  precise  thing  to  be  done  by  him,  considering 
the  climate,  the  soil,  the  length  of  the  day,  the  wants 
of  the  people,  the  habit  and  form  of  the  govern- 
ment, he  will  create  a  house  in  which  all  these  will 
find  themselves  fitted,  and  taste  and  sentiment  will 
be  satisfied  'also. 

Insist  on  yourself ;  never  imitate.  Your  own  gift 
you  can  present  every  moment  with  the  cumulative 
force  of  a  whole  life's  cultivation ;  but  of  the 
adopted  talent  of  another,  you  have  only  an  ex- 
temporaneous, half  possession.  That  which  each 
can  do  best,  none  but  his  Maker  can  teach  him.  No 
man  yet  knows  what  it  is,  nor  can,  till  that  person 
has  exhibited  it.  Where  is  the  master  who  could 
have  taught  Shakespeare?  Where  is  the  master 
who  could  have  instructed  Franklin,  or  Washington, 
or  Bacon,  or  Newton  ?  Every  great  man  is  a  unique. 
The  Scipionism  of  Scipio  is  precisely  that  part  he 
could  not  borrow.  Shakespeare  will  never  be  made 
by  the  study  of  Shakespeare.  Do  that  which  is 


Emerson  269 

assigned  you,  and  you  cannot  hope  too  much  or  dare 
too  much.  There  is  at  this  moment  for  you  an 
utterance  brave  and  grand  as  that  of  the  colossal 
chisel  of  Phidias,  or  trowel  of  the  Egyptians,  or 
the  pen  of  Moses,  or  Dante,  but  different  from  all 
these.  Not  possibly  will  the  soul  all  rich,  all  elo- 
quent, with  thousand-cloven  tongue,  deign  to  repeat 
itself;  but  if  you  can  hear  what  these  patriarchs 
say,  surely  you  can  reply  to  them  in  the  same  pitch 
of  voice ;  for  the  ear  and  the  tongue  are  two  organs 
of  one  nature.  Abide  in  the  simple  and  noble  re- 
gions of  thy  life,  obey  thy  heart,  and  thou  shalt 
reproduce  the  Foreworld  again. 

4.  As  our  Religion,  our  Education,  our  Art  look 
abroad,  so  does  our  spirit  of  society.  All  men  plume 
themselves  on  the  improvement  of  society,  and  no 
man  improves. 

Society  never  advances.  It  recedes  as  fast  on  one 
side  as  it  gains  on  the  other.  It  undergoes  continual 
changes ;  it  is  barbarous,  it  is  civilized,  it  is  Chris- 
tianized, it  is  rich,  it  is  scientific;  but  this  change 
is  not  amelioration.  For  everything  that  is  given, 
something  is  taken.  Society  acquires  new  arts,  and 
loses  old  instincts.  What  a  contrast  between  the 
well-clad,  reading,  writing,  thinking  American,  with 
a  watch,  a  pencil,  and  a  bill  of  exchange  in  his 
pocket,  and  the  naked  New-Zealander,  whose  prop- 
erty is  a  club,  a  spear,  a  mat,  and  an  undivided 
twentieth  of  a  shed  to  sleep  under!  But  com- 
pare the  health  of  the  two  men,  and  you  shall  see 
that  the  white  man  has  lost  his  aboriginal  strength. 
If  the  traveller  tell  us  truly,  strike  the  savage  with 
a  broad  axe,  and  in  a  day  or  two  the  flesh  shall 
unite  and  heal  as  if  you  struck  the  blow  into  soft 


270  Best  English  Essays 

pitch,  and  the  same  blow  shall  send  the  white  to 
his  grave. 

The  civilized  man  has  built  a  coach,  but  has  lost 
the  use  of  his  feet.  He  is  supported  on  crutches, 
but  lacks  so  much  support  of  muscle.  He  has  a 
fine  Geneva  watch,  but  he  fails  of  the  skill  to  tell 
the  hour  by  the  sun.  A  Greenwich  nautical  almanac 
he  has,  and  so  being  sure  of  the  information  when 
he  wants  it,  the  man  in  the  street  does  not  know 
a  star  in  the  sky.  The  solstice  he  does  not  observe, 
the  equinox  he  knows  as  little ;  and  the  whole  bright 
calendar  of  the  year  is  without  a  dial  in  his  mind. 
His  note-books  impair  his  memory ;  his  libraries 
overload  his  wit ;  the  insurance  office  increases  the 
number  of  accidents ;  and  it  may  be  a  question 
whether  machinery  does  not  encumber;  whether 
we  have  not  lost  by  refinement  some  energy,  by 
a  Christianity  intrenched  in  establishments  and 
forms,  some  vigor  of  wild  virtue.  For  every  Stoic 
was  a  Stoic;  but  in  Christendom  where  is  the 
Christian  ? 

There  is  no  more  deviation  in  the  moral  standard 
than  in  the  standard  of  height  or  bulk.  No  greater 
men  are  now  than  ever  were.  A  singular  equality 
may  be  observed  between  the  great  men  of  the  first 
and  of  the  last  ages ;  nor  can  all  the  science,  art, 
religion,  and  philosophy  of  the  nineteenth  century 
avail  to  educate  greater  men  than  Plutarch's  heroes, 
three  or  four  and  twenty  centuries  ago.  Not  in  time 
is  the  race  progressive.  Phocion,  Socrates,  Anax- 
agoras,  Diogenes,  are  great  men,  but  they  leave 
no  class.  He  who  is  really  of  their  class  will  not  be 
called  by  their  name,  but  will  be  his  own  man,  and, 
in  his  turn,  the  founder  of  a  sect.  The  arts  and  in- 


Emerson  271 

ventions  of  each  period  are  only  its  costume,  and 
do  not  invigorate  men.  The  harm  of  the  improved 
machinery  may  compensate  its  good.  Hudson  and 
Behring  accomplished  so  much  in  their  fishing- 
boats,  as  to  astonish  Parry  and  Franklin,  whose 
equipment  exhausted  the  resources  of  science  and 
art.  Galileo,  with  an  opera-glass,  discovered  a 
more  splendid  series  of  celestial  phenomena  than 
any  one  since.  Columbus  found  the  New  World 
in  an  undecked  boat.  It  is  curious  to  see  the  period- 
ical disuse  and  perishing  of  means  and  machinery, 
which  were  introduced  with  loud  laudation  a  few 
years  or  centuries  before.  The  great  genius  returns 
to  essential  man.  We  reckoned  the  improvements 
of  the  art  of  war  among  the  triumphs  of  science, 
and  yet  Napoleon  conquered  Europe  by  the  bivouac, 
which  consisted  of  falling  back  on  naked  valor,  and 
disencumbering  it  of  all  aids.  The  Emperor  held 
it  impossible  to  make  a  perfect  army,  says  Las  Casas, 
"  without  abolishing  our  arms,  magazines,  commis- 
saries, and  carriages,  until,  in  imitation  of  the  Ro- 
man custom,  the  soldier  should  receive  his  supply 
of  corn,  grind  it  in  his  hand-mill,  and  bake  his  bread 
himself." 

Society  is  a  wave.  The  wave  moves  onward,  but 
the  water  of  which  it  is  composed  does  not.  The 
same  particle  does  not  rise  from  the  valley  to  the 
ridge.  Its  unity  is  only  phenomenal.  The  persons 
who  make  up  a  nation  to-day,  next  year  die,  and 
their  experience  with  them. 

And  so  the  reliance  on  Property,  including  the 
reliance  on  governments  which  protect  it,  is  the 
want  of  self-reliance.  Men  have  looked  away  from 
themselves  and  at  things  so  long,  that  they  have 


Best  English  Essays 

come  to  esteem  the  religious,  learned,  and  civil  in- 
stitutions as  guards  of  property,  and  they  deprecate 
assaults  on  these,  because  they  feel  them  to  be 
assaults  on  property.  They  measure  their  esteem 
of  each  other  by  what  each  has,  and  not  by  what 
each  is.  But  a  cultivated  man  becomes  ashamed  of 
his  property,  out  of  new  respect  for  his  nature. 
Especially  he  hates  what  he  has,  if  he  see  that  it 
is  accidental,  —  came  to  him  by  inheritance,  or  gift, 
or  crime;  then  he  feels  that  it  is  not  having;  it 
does  not  belong  to  him,  has  no  root  in  him,  and 
merely  lies  there,  because  no  revolution  or  no  robber 
takes  it  away.  But  that  which  a  man  is  does  always 
by  necessity  acquire,  and  what  the  man  acquires  is 
living  property,  which  does  not  wait  the  beck  of 
rulers,  or  mobs,  or  revolutions,  or  fire,  or  storm,  or 
bankruptcies,  but  perpetually  renews  itself  wherever 
the  man  breathes.  "  Thy  lot  or  portion  of  life,"  said 
the  Caliph  AH,  "  is  seeking  after  thee ;  therefore  be 
at  rest  from  seeking  after  it."  Our  dependence  on 
these  foreign  goods  leads  us  to  our  slavish  respect 
for  numbers.  The  political  parties  meet  in  numer- 
ous conventions;  the  greater  the  concourse,  and 
with  each  new  uproar  of  announcement,  —  The 
delegation  from  Essex !  The  Democrats  from  New 
Hampshire !  The  Whigs  of  Maine !  —  the  young 
patriot  feels  himself  stronger  than  before  by  a  new 
thousand  of  eyes  and  arms.  In  like  manner  the 
reformers  summon  conventions,  and  vote  and  re- 
solve in  multitude.  Not  so,  O  friends,  will  the  God 
deign  to  enter  and  inhabit  you,  but  by  a  method 
precisely  the  reverse.  It  is  only  as  a  man  puts  off 
all  foreign  support,  and  stands  alone,  that  I  see 
him  to  be  strong  and  to  prevail.  He  is  weaker  by 


Emerson  273 

every  recruit  to  his  banner.  Is  not  a  man  better 
than  a  town  ?  Ask  nothing  of  men,  and  in  the  end- 
less mutation,  thou  only  firm  column  must  presently 
appear  the  upholder  of  all  that  surrounds  thee.  He 
who  knows  that  power  is  inborn,  that  he  is  weak 
because  he  has  looked  for  good  out  of  him  and 
elsewhere,  and  so  perceiving,  throws  himself 
unhesitatingly  on  his  thought,  instantly  rights 
himself,  stands  in  the  erect  position,  commands  his 
limbs,  works  miracles;  just  as  a  man  who  stands 
on  his  feet  is  stronger  than  a  man  who  stands  on 
his  head. 

So  use  all  that  is  called  Fortune.  Most  men  gam- 
ble with  her,  and  gain  all,  and  lose  all,  as  her  wheel 
rolls.  But  do  thou  leave  as  unlawful  these  winnings, 
and  deal  with  Cause  and  Effect,  the  chancellors  of 
God.  In  the  Will  work  and  acquire,  and  thou  hast 
chained  the  wheel  of  Chance,  and  shalt  sit  hereafter 
out  of  fear  from  her  rotations.  A  political  victory, 
a  rise  of  rents,  the  recovery  of  your  sick,  or  the 
return  of  your  absent  friend,  or  some  other  favor- 
able event,  raises  your  spirits,  and  you  think  good 
days  are  preparing  for  you.  Do  not  believe  it. 
Nothing  can  bring  you  peace  but  yourself.  Nothing 
can  bring  you  peace  but  the  triumph  of  principles. 


18 


VIII 
MACAULAY 


MACAULAY: 
THE    RHETORICIAN 

IT  has  been  the  fashion  in  these  later  days  to 
depreciate   Macaulay.      "  A   mere   rhetori- 
cian "  has  become  almost  a  cant  word  in 
connection  with  him.     Yet  in  his  day  he  had  a 
more  decided  and  obvious  influence  on  the  style 
of  young  men  of  all  conditions  than  any  other 
writer  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

Macaulay 's  style  is  the  style  of  the  orator 
adapted  to  the  purposes  of  the  essay  writer.  He 
is  above  all  clear  and  simple.  His  ideas  are 
neither  many  nor  profound,  but  they  are  impor- 
tant of  their  kind.  His  special  merit  is  that  he 
illustrates  his  thought  with  all  the  arts  of  elo- 
quence. His  special  rhetorical  weapon  is  antith- 
esis and  the  balanced-sentence  structure.  This 
has  a  simple  cadence  that  readily  catches  and 
charms  the  ear.  There  is  in  it  not  only  cadence, 
but  movement,  vivacity,  and  inspiration.  We  see 
how  the  hearer  may  be  swept  onward  to  almost 
any  conclusion  by  the  logical  succession  of  the 
thoughts  coupled  with  the  sweep  of  the  orator's 
magnetism.  The  art  of  eloquence  is  a  fine  one, 
and  one  well  worth  cultivating.  It  was  the  art 
made  so  famous  by  the  speakers  in  the  Athenian 


278  Best  English  Essays 

agora,  and  it  is  to  that  art  wholly  that  Aristotle's 
treatise  on  rhetoric  is  devoted. 

Macaulay's  methods  of  adapting  the  peculiar 
gifts  of  the  public  speaker  to  written  prose  are 
simple.  First,  the  ideas  are  arranged  in  logical 
order,  one  leading  up  to  and  preparing  the  way 
for  the  next,  so  that  the  most  cursory  reader  can- 
not fail  to  perceive  the  connection,  and  he  who 
runs  may  read.  Then  all  facts  and  conclusions 
are  stated  vividly  by  means  of  sharp  contrasts, 
and  each  important  point  is  repeated  in  many  dif- 
ferent ways  until  the  reader  has  been  forced  by 
the  mere  reading  of  the  words  to  take  sufficient 
time  to  let  it  sink  into  his  mind.  The  art  of  pro- 
portioning the  time  and  attention  to  be  given  to 
each  essential  point  is  one  which  the  orator  under- 
stands in  perfection,  but  which  the  writer  who  is 
not  constantly  thinking  of  his  audience  usually 
fails  to  master.  It  is  nevertheless  one  of  the  most 
important  acquirements  for  every  writer  who 
wishes  to  be  effective.  In  this  especially  Macau- 
lay  is  our  most  useful  model. 

THE   PURITANS 

(Essay  on  Milton) 

WE  would  speak  first  of  the  Puritans,  the  most 
remarkable  body   of   men,   perhaps,   which 
the  world  has  ever  produced.    The  odious  and  ridic- 
ulous parts  of  their  character  lie  on  the  surface.    He 


Macaulay  279 

that  runs  may  read  them;  nor  have  there  been 
wanting  attentive  and  malicious  observers  to  point 
them  out.  For  many  years  after  the  Restoration, 
they  were  the  theme  of  unmeasured  invective  and 
derision.  They  were  exposed  to  the  utmost  licen- 
tiousness of  the  press  and  of  the  stage,  at  the  time 
when  the  press  and  the  stage  were  most  licentious. 
They  were  not  men  of  letters ;  they  were,  as  a  body, 
unpopular;  they  could  not  defend  themselves;  and 
the  public  would  not  take  them  under  its  protection. 
They  were  therefore  abandoned,  without  reserve, 
to  the  tender  mercies  of  the  satirists  and  dramatists. 
The  ostentatious  simplicity  of  their  dress,  their  sour 
aspect,  their  nasal  twang,  their  stiff  posture,  their 
long  graces,  their  Hebrew  names,  the  Scriptural 
phrases  which  they  introduced  on  every  occasion, 
their  contempt  of  human  learning,  their  detestation 
of  polite  amusements,  were  indeed  fair  game  for  the 
laughers.  But  it  is  not  from  the  laughers  alone 
that  the  philosophy  of  history  is  to  be  learnt.  And 
he  who  approaches  this  subject  should  carefully 
guard  against  the  influence  of  that  potent  ridicule 
which  has  already  misled  so  many  excellent  writers. 

"Ecco  il  fonte  del  riso,  ed  ecco  il  rio 
Che  mortal!  perigli  in  se  contiene : 
Hor  qui  tener  a  fren  nostro  desio, 
Ed  esser  cauti  molto  a  noi  conviene." 

Those  who  roused  the  people  to  resistance,  who 
directed  their  measures  through  a  long  series  of 
eventful  years,  who  formed,  out  of  the  most  un- 
promising materials,  the  finest  army  that  Europe 
had  ever  seen,  who  trampled  down  King,  Church, 
and  Aristocracy,  who,  in  the  short  intervals  of 


280  Best  English  Essays 

domestic  sedition  and  rebellion,  made  the  name  of 
England  terrible  to  every  nation  on  the  face  of  the 
earth,  were  no  vulgar  fanatics.  Most  of  their  ab- 
surdities were  mere  external  badges,  like  the  signs 
of  freemasonry,  or  the  dresses  of  friars.  We  regret 
that  these  badges  were  not  more  attractive.  We 
regret  that  a  body  to  whose  courage  and  talents 
mankind  has  owed  inestimable  obligations  had  not 
the  lofty  elegance  which  distinguished  some  of  the 
adherents  of  Charles  the  First,  or  the  easy  good- 
breeding  for  which  the  court  of  Charles  the  Second 
was  celebrated.  But,  if  we  must  make  our  choice, 
we  shall,  like  Bassanio  in  the  play,  turn  from  the 
specious  caskets  which  contain  only  the  Death's 
head  and  the  Fool's  head,  and  fix  on  the  plain  leaden 
chest  which  conceals  the  treasure. 

The  Puritans  were  men  whose  minds  had  derived 
a  peculiar  character  from  the  daily  contemplation  of 
superior  beings  and  eternal  interests.  Not  content 
with  acknowledging,  in  general  terms,  an  overruling 
Providence,  they  habitually  ascribed  every  event  to 
the  will  of  the  Great  Being,  for  whose  power  nothing 
was  too  vast,  for  whose  inspection  nothing  was  too 
minute.  To  know  him,  to  serve  him,  to  enjoy  him, 
was  with  them  the  great  end  of  existence.  They 
rejected  with  contempt  the  ceremonious  homage 
which. other  sects  substituted  for  the  pure  worship 
of  the  soul.  Instead  of  catching  occasional  glimpses 
of  the  Deity  through  an  obscuring  veil,  they  as- 
pired to  gaze  full  on  his  intolerable  brightness,  and 
to  commune  with  him  face  to  face.  Hence  origi- 
nated their  contempt  for  terrestrial  distinctions. 
The  difference  between  the  greatest  and  the  meanest 
of  mankind  seemed  to  vanish,  when  compared  with 


Macaulay  281 

the  boundless  interval  which  separated  the  whole 
race  from  him  on  whom  their  own  eyes  were  con- 
stantly fixed.  They  recognised  no  title  to  supe- 
riority but  his  favour ;  and,  confident  of  that  favour, 
they  despised  all  the  accomplishments  and  all  the 
dignities  of  the  world.  If  they  were  unacquainted 
with  the  works  of  philosophers  and  poets,  they  were 
deeply  read  in  the  oracles  of  God.  If  their  names 
were  not  found  in  the  registers  of  heralds,  they  were 
recorded  in  the  Book  of  Life.  If  their  steps  were 
not  accompanied  by  a  splendid  train  of  menials, 
legions  of  ministering  angels  had  charge  over  them. 
Their  palaces  were  houses  not  made  with  hands ; 
their  diadems  crowns  of  glory  which  should  never 
fade  away.  On  the  rich  and  the  eloquent,  on  nobles 
and  priests,  they  looked  down  with  contempt :  for 
they  esteemed  themselves  rich  in  a  more  precious 
treasure,  and  eloquent  in  a  more  sublime  language, 
nobles  by  the  right  of  an  earlier  creation,  and  priests 
by  the  imposition  of  a  mightier  hand.  The  very 
meanest  of  them  was  a  being  to  whose  fate  a  myste- 
rious and  terrible  importance  belonged,  on  whose 
slightest  action  the  spirits  of  light  and  darkness 
looked  with  anxious  interest,  who  had  been  destined, 
before  heaven  and  earth  were  created,  to  enjoy  a 
felicity  which  should  continue  when  heaven  and 
earth  should  have  passed  away.  Events  which 
short-sighted  politicians  ascribed  to  earthly  causes, 
had  been  ordained  on  his  account.  For  his  sake 
empires  had  risen,  and  flourished,  and  decayed.  For 
his  sake  the  Almighty  had  proclaimed  his  will  by 
the  pen  of  the  Evangelist,  and  the  harp  of  the 
prophet.  He  had  been  wrested  by  no  common 
deliverer  from  the  grasp  of  no  common  foe.  He 


282  Best  English  Essays 

had  been  ransomed  by  the  sweat  of  no  vulgar  agony, 
by  the  blood  of  no  earthly  sacrifice.  It  was  for  him 
that  the  sun  had  been  darkened,  that  the  rocks  had 
been  rent,  that  the  dead  had  risen,  that  all  nature 
had  shuddered  at  the  sufferings  of  her  expiring  God. 
Thus  the  Puritan  was  made  up  of  two  different 
men,  the  one  all  self-abasement,  penitence,  grati- 
tude, passion;  the  other  proud,  calm,  inflexible, 
sagacious.  He  prostrated  himself  in  the  dust  before 
his  Maker :  but  he  set  his  foot  on  the  neck  of  his 
king.  In  his  devotional  retirement,  he  prayed  with 
convulsions,  and  groans,  and  tears.  He  was  half- 
maddened  by  glorious  or  terrible  illusions.  He 
heard  the  lyres  of  angels  or  the  tempting  whispers 
of  fiends.  He  caught  a  gleam  of  the  Beatific  Vision, 
or  woke  screaming  from  dreams  of  everlasting  fire. 
Like  Vane,  he  thought  himself  intrusted  with  the 
sceptre  of  the  millennial  year.  Like  Fleetwood,  he 
cried  in  the  bitterness  of  his  soul  that  God  had  hid 
his  face  from  him.  But  when  he  took  his  seat  in 
the  council,  or  girt  on  his  sword  for  war,  these  tem- 
pestuous workings  of  the  soul  had  left  no  perceptible 
trace  behind  them.  People  who  saw  nothing  of  the 
godly  but  their  uncouth  visages,  and  heard  nothing 
from  them  but  their  groans  and  their  whining 
hymns,  might  laugh  at  them.  But  those  had  little 
reason  to  laugh  who  encountered  them  in  the  hall 
of  debate  or  in  the  field  of  battle.  These  fanatics 
brought  to  civil  and  military  affairs  a  coolness  of 
judgment  and  an  immutability  of  purpose  which 
some  writers  have  thought  inconsistent  with  their 
religious  zeal,  but  which  were  in  fact  the  necessary 
effects  of  it.  The  intensity  of  their  feelings  on  one 
subject  made  them  tranquil  on  every  other.  One 


Macaulay  283 

overpowering  sentiment  had  subjected  to  itself  pity 
and  hatred,  ambition  and  fear.  Death  had  lost  its 
terrors  and  pleasure  its  charms.  They  had  their 
smiles  and  their  tears,  their  raptures  and  their  sor- 
rows, but  not  for  the  things  of  this  world.  Enthu- 
siasm had  made  them  Stoics,  had  cleared  their 
minds  from  every  vulgar  passion  and  prejudice,  and 
raised  them  above  the  influence  of  danger  and  of 
corruption.  It  sometimes  might  lead  them  to  pur- 
sue unwise  ends,  but  never  to  choose  unwise  means. 
They  went  through  the  world,  like  Sir  Artegal's 
iron  man  Talus  with  his  flail,  crushing  and  tramp- 
ling down  oppressors,  mingling  with  human  beings, 
but  having  neither  part  nor  lot  in  human  infirmities, 
insensible  to  fatigue,  to  pleasure,  and  to  pain,  not 
to  be  pierced  by  any  weapon,  not  to  be  withstood 
by  any  barrier. 

Such  we  believe  to  have  been  the  character  of  the 
Puritans.  We  perceive  the  absurdity  of  their  man- 
ners. We  dislike  the  sullen  gloom  of  their  domestic 
habits.  We  acknowledge  that  the  tone  of  their 
minds  was  often  injured  by  straining  after  things 
too  high  for  mortal  reach :  and  we  know  that,  in 
spite  of  their  hatred  of  Popery,  they  too  often  fell 
into  the  worst  vices  of  that  bad  system,  intolerance 
and  extravagant  austerity,  that  they  had  their  an- 
chorites and  their  crusades,  their  Dunstans  and  their 
De  Montforts,  their  Dominies  and  their  Escobars. 
Yet,  when  all  circumstances  are  taken  into  consider- 
ation, we  do  not  hesitate  to  pronounce  them  a  brave, 
a  wise,  an  honest,  and  an  useful  body. 


1  Macaulay's  criticisms  of  Croker's  editorial  work  are  omitted, 
but  nothing  else. 


284  Best  English  Essays 

BOSWELL'S    "LIFE   OF   JOHNSON" 

THE  "  Life  of  Johnson  "  is  assuredly  a  great, 
a  very  great  work.  Homer  is  not  more 
decidedly  the  first  of  heroic  poets,  Shakespeare  is 
not  more  decidedly  the  first  of  dramatists,  Demos- 
thenes is  not  more  decidedly  the  first  of  orators, 
than  Boswell  is  the  first  of  biographers.  He  has 
no  second.  He  has  distanced  all  his  competitors 
so  decidedly  that  it  is  not  worth  while  to  place 
them.  Eclipse  is  first,  and  the  rest  nowhere. 

We  are  not  sure  that  there  is  in  the  whole  history 
of  the  human  intellect  so  strange  a  phenomenon  as 
this  book.  Many  of  the  greatest  men  that  ever  lived 
have  written  biography.  Boswell  was  one  of  the 
smallest  men  that  ever  lived,  and  he  has  beaten  them 
all.  He  was,  if  we  are  to  give  any  credit  to  his 
own  account  or  to  the  united  testimony  of  all  who 
knew  him,  a  man  of  the  meanest  and  feeblest  intel- 
lect. Johnson  described  him  as  a  fellow  who  had 
missed  his  only  chance  of  immortality  by  not  having 
been  alive  when  the  "Dunciad"  was  written.  Beau- 
clerk  used  his  name  as  a  proverbial  expression  for 
a  bore.  He  was  the  laughing-stock  of  the  whole  of 
that  brilliant  society  which  has  owed  to  him  the 
greater  part  of  its  fame.  He  was  always  laying 
himself  at  the  feet  of  some  eminent  man,  and  beg- 
ging to  be  spit  upon  and  trampled  upon.  He  was 
always  earning  some  ridiculous  nickname,  and  then 
"  binding  it  as  a  crown  unto  him,"  not  merely  in 
metaphor,  but  literally.  He  exhibited  himself,  at 
the  Shakespeare  Jubilee,  to  all  the  crowd  which 
filled  Stratford-on-Avon,  with  a  placard  round  his 
hat  bearing  the  inscription  of  Corsica  Boswell.  In 


Macaulay  285 

his  "  Tour,"  he  proclaimed  to  all  the  world  that  at 
Edinburgh  he  was  known  by  the  appellation  of 
Paoli  Boswell.  Servile  and  impertinent,  shallow 
and  pedantic,  a  bigot  and  a  sot,  bloated  with  family 
pride,  and  eternally  blustering  about  the  dignity  of 
a  born  gentleman,  yet  stooping  to  be  a  talebearer, 
an  eavesdropper,  a  common  butt  in  the  taverns  of 
London,  so  curious  to  know  every  body  who  was 
talked  about,  that,  Tory  and  high  Churchman  as 
he  was,  he  manoeuvred,  we  have  been  told,  for 
an  introduction  to  Tom  Paine,  so  vain  of  the  most 
childish  distinctions,  that  when  he  had  been  to 
court,  he  drove  to  the  office  where  his  book  was 
printing  without  changing  his  clothes,  and  sum- 
moned all  the  printer's  devils  to  admire  his  new 
ruffles  and  sword ;  such  was  this  man,  and  such  he 
was  content  and  proud  to  be.  Everything  which 
another  man  would  have  hidden,  everything  the 
publication  of  which  would  have  made  another  man 
hang  himself,  was  matter  of  gay  and  clamorous 
exultation  to  his  weak  and  diseased  mind.  What 
silly  things  he  said,  what  bitter  retorts  he  provoked, 
how  at  one  place  he  was  troubled  with  evil  pre- 
sentiments which  came  to  nothing,  how  at  another 
place,  on  waking  from  a  drunken  doze,  he  read 
the  prayerbook  and  took  a  hair  of  the  dog  that  had 
bitten  him,  how  he  went  to  see  men  hanged  and 
came  away  maudlin,  how  he  added  five  hundred 
pounds  to  the  fortune  of  one  of  his  babies  because 
she  was  not  scared  at  Johnson's  ugly  face,  how  he 
was  frightened  out  of  his  wits  at  sea,  and  how  the 
sailors  quieted  him  as  they  would  have  quieted  a 
child,  how  tipsy  he  was  at  Lady  Cork's  one  even- 
ing and  how  much  his  merriment  annoyed  the 
ladies,  how  impertinent  he  was  to  the  Duchess  of 


286  Best  English  Essays 

Argyle  and  with  what  stately  contempt  she  put  down 
his  impertinence,  how  Colonel  Macleod  sneered  to 
his  face  at  his  impudent  obtrusiveness,  how  his 
father  and  the  very  wife  of  his  bosom  laughed  and 
fretted  at  his  fooleries ;  all  these  things  he  pro- 
claimed to  all  the  world,  as  if  they  had  been  subjects 
for  pride  and  ostentatious  rejoicing.  All  the  caprices 
of  his  temper,  all  the  illusions  of  his  vanity,  all  his 
hypochondriac  whimsies,  all  his  castles  in  the  air, 
he  displayed  with  a  cool  self-complacency,  a  perfect 
unconsciousness  that  he  was  making  a  fool  of  him- 
self, to  which  it  is  impossible  to  find  a  parallel  in 
the  whole  history  of  mankind.  He  has  used  many 
people  ill;  but  assuredly  he  has  used  nobody  so  ill 
as  himself. 

That  such  a  man  should  have  written  one  of  the 
best  books  in  the  world  is  strange  enough.  But 
this  is  not  all.  Many  persons  who  have  conducted 
themselves  foolishly  in  active  life,  and  whose  con- 
versation has  indicated  no  superior  powers  of  mind, 
have  left  us  valuable  works.  Goldsmith  was  very 
justly  described  by  one  of  his  contemporaries  as 
an  inspired  idiot,  and  by  another  as  a  being 

"  Who  wrote  like  an  angel,  and  talked  like  poor  Poll." 

La  Fontaine  was  in  society  a  mere  simpleton.  His 
blunders  would  not  come  in  amiss  among  the  stories 
of  Hierocles.  But  these  men  attained  literary  emi- 
nence in  spite  of  their  weaknesses.  Boswell  attained 
it  by  reason  of  his  weaknesses.  If  he  had  not  been 
a  great  fool,  he  would  never  have  been  a  great 
writer.  Without  all  the  qualities  which  made  him 
the  jest  and  the  torment  of  those  among  whom  he 
lived,  without  the  officiousness,  the  inquisitiveness, 
the  effrontery,  the  toad-eating,  the  insensibility  to 


Macaulay  287 

all  reproof,  he  never  could  have  produced  so  ex- 
cellent a  book.  He  was  a  slave,  proud  of  his  servi- 
tude, a  Paul  Pry,  convinced  that  his  own  curiosity 
and  garrulity  were  virtues,  an  unsafe  companion 
who  never  scrupled  to  repay  the  most  liberal  hos- 
pitality by  the  basest  violation  of  confidence,  a  man 
without  delicacy,  without  shame,  without  sense 
enough  to  know  when  he  was  hurting  the  feelings 
of  others  or  when  he  was  exposing  himself  to 
derision ;  and  because  he  was  all  this,  he  has,  in 
an  important  department  of  literature,  immeasur- 
ably surpassed  such  writers  as  Tacitus,  Clarendon, 
Alfieri,  and  his  own  idol  Johnson. 

Of  the  talents  which  ordinarily  raise  men  to 
eminence  as  writers,  Boswell  had  absolutely  none. 
There  is  not  in  all  his  books  a  single  remark  of 
his  own  on  literature,  politics,  religion,  or  society, 
which  is  not  either  commonplace  or  absurd.  His 
dissertations  on  hereditary  gentility,  on  the  slave- 
trade,  and  on  the  entailing  of  landed  estates,  may 
serve  as  examples.  To  say  that  these  passages  are 
sophistical  would  be  to  pay  them  an  extravagant 
compliment.  They  have  no  pretence  to  argument, 
or  even  to  meaning.  He  has  reported  innumerable 
observations  made  by  himself  in  the  course  of  con- 
versation. Of  those  observations  we  do  not  remem- 
ber one  which  is  above  the  intellectual  capacity  of 
a  boy  of  fifteen.  He  has  printed  many  of  his  own 
letters,  and  in  these  letters  he  is  always  ranting  or 
twaddling.  Logic,  eloquence,  wit,  taste,  all  those 
things  which  are  generally  considered  as  making 
a  book  valuable,  were  utterly  wanting  to  him.  He 
had,  indeed,  a  quick  observation  and  a  retentive 
memory.  These  qualities,  if  he  had  been  a  man  of 


288  Best  English  Essays 

sense  and  virtue,  would  scarcely  of  themselves  have 
sufficed  to  make  him  conspicuous ;  but  because 
he  was  a  dunce,  a  parasite,  and  a  coxcomb,  they 
have  made  him  immortal. 

Those  parts  of  his  book  which,  considered  ab- 
stractedly, are  most  utterly  worthless,  are  delightful 
when  we  read  them  as  illustrations  of  the  character 
of  the  writer.  Bad  in  themselves,  they  are  good 
dramatically,  like  the  nonsense  of  Justice  Shallow, 
the  clipped  English  of  Dr.  Caius,  or  the  misplaced 
consonants  of  Fluellen.  Of  all  confessors,  Boswell 
is  the  most  candid.  Other  men  who  have  pretended 
to  lay  open  their  own  hearts,  Rousseau,  for  ex- 
ample, and  Lord  Byron,  have  evidently  written  with 
a  constant  view  to  effect,  and  are  to  be  then  most 
distrusted  when  they  seem  to  be  most  sincere. 
There  is  scarcely  any  man  who  would  not  rather 
accuse  himself  of  great  crimes  and  of  dark  and 
tempestuous  passions  than  proclaim  all  his  little 
vanities  and  wild  fancies.  It  would  be  easier  to 
find  a  person  who  would  avow  actions  like  those  of 
Caesar  Borgia  or  Danton,  than  one  who  would 
publish  a  day  dream  like  those  of  Alnaschar  and 
Malvolio.  Those  weaknesses  which  most  men  keep 
covered  up  in  the  most  secret  places  of  the  mind, 
not  to  be  disclosed  to  the  eye  of  friendship  or  of 
love,  were  precisely  the  weaknesses  which  Boswell 
paraded  before  all  the  world.  He  was  perfectly 
frank,  because  the  weakness  of  his  understanding 
and  the  tumult  of  his  spirits  prevented  him  from 
knowing  when  he  made  himself  ridiculous.  His 
book  resembles  nothing  so  much  as  the  conver- 
sation of  the  inmates  of  the  Palace  of  Truth. 

His  fame  is  great ;  and  it  will,  we  have  no  doubt, 


Macaulay  289 

be  lasting;  but  it  is  fame  of  a  peculiar  kind,  and 
indeed  marvellously  resembles  infamy.  We  remem- 
ber no  other  case  in  which  the  world  has  made  so 
great  a  distinction  between  a  book  and  its  author. 
In  general,  the  book  and  the  author  are  considered 
as  one.  To  admire  the  book  is  to  admire  the  author. 
The  case  of  Boswell  is  an  exception,  we  think  the 
only  exception,  to  this  rule.  His  work  is  universally 
allowed  to  be  interesting,  instructive,  eminently 
original:  yet  it  has  brought  him  nothing  but  con- 
tempt. All  the  world  reads  it,  all  the  world  delights 
in  it:  yet  we  do  not  remember  ever  to  have  read 
or  ever  to  have  heard  any  expression  of  respect 
and  admiration  for  the  man  to  whom  we  owe  so 
much  instruction  and  amusement.  While  edition 
after  edition  of  his  book  was  coming  forth,  his  son, 
as  Mr.  Croker  tells  us,  was  ashamed  of  it,  and 
hated  to  hear  it  mentioned.  This  feeling  was  natu- 
ral and  reasonable.  Sir  Alexander  saw  that  in 
proportion  to  the  celebrity  of  the  work,  was  the 
degradation  of  the  author.  The  very  editors  of 
this  unfortunate  gentleman's  books  have  forgotten 
their  allegiance,  and,  like  those  Puritan  casuists  who 
took  arms  by  the  authority  of  the  king  against  his 
person,  have  attacked  the  writer  while  doing  hom- 
age to  the  writings.  Mr.  Croker,  for  example,  has 
published  two  thousand  five  hundred  notes  on  the 
life  of  Johnson,  and  yet  scarcely  ever  mentions  the 
biographer  whose  performance  he  has  taken  such 
pains  to  illustrate,  without  some  expression  of 
contempt. 

An  ill-natured  man  Boswell  certainly  was  not. 
Yet  the  malignity  of  the  most  malignant  satirist 
could  scarcely  cut  deeper  than  his  thoughtless  lo- 

'9 


190  Best  English  Essays 

quacity.  Having  himself  no  sensibility  to  derision 
and  contempt,  he  took  it  for  granted  that  all  others 
were  equally  callous.  He  was  not  ashamed  to 
exhibit  himself  to  the  whole  world  as  a  common 
spy,  a  common  tattler,  a  humble  companion  without 
the  excuse  of  poverty,  and  to  tell  a  hundred  stories 
of  his  own  pertness  and  folly,  and  of  the  insults 
which  his  pertness  and  folly  brought  upon  him. 
It  was  natural  that  he  should  show  little  discretion 
in  cases  in  which  the  feelings  or  the  honour  of 
others  might  be  concerned.  No  man,  surely,  ever 
published  such  stories  respecting  persons  whom  he 
professed  to  love  and  revere.  He  would  infallibly 
have  made  his  hero  as  contemptible  as  he  has  made 
himself,  had  not  his  hero  really  possessed  some 
moral  and  intellectual  qualities  of  a  very  high  order. 
The  best  proof  that  Johnson  was  really  an  extraordi- 
nary man  is  that  his  character,  instead  of  being 
degraded,  has,  on  the  whole,  been  decidedly  raised 
by  a  work  in  which  all  his  vices  and  weaknesses 
are  exposed  more  unsparingly  than  they  ever  were 
exposed  by  Churchill  or  by  Kenrick. 

Johnson  grown  old,  Johnson  in  the  fulness  of  his 
fame  and  in  the  enjoyment  of  a  competent  fortune, 
is  better  known  to  us  than  any  other  man  in  history. 
Every  thing  about  him,  his  coat,  his  wig,  his  figure, 
his  face,  his  scrofula,  his  St.  Vitus's  dance,  his  roll- 
ing walk,  his  blinking  eye,  the  outward  signs  which 
too  clearly  marked  his  approbation  of  his  dinner,  his 
insatiable  appetite  for  fish-sauce  and  veal-pie  with 
plums,  his  inextinguishable  thirst  for  tea,  his  trick 
of  touching  the  posts  as  he  walked,  his  mysterious 
practice  of  treasuring  up  scraps  of  orange-peel, 
his  morning  slumbers,  his  midnight  disputations, 


Macaulay  291 

his  contortions,  his  mutterings,  his  gruntings,  his 
puffings,  his  vigorous,  acute,  and  ready  eloquence, 
his  sarcastic  wit,  his  vehemence,  his  insolence, 
his  fits  of  tempestuous  rage,  his  queer  inmates, 
old  Mr.  Levett  and  blind  Mrs.  Williams,  the  cat 
Hodge  and  the  negro  Frank,  all  are  as  famil- 
iar to  us  as  the  objects  by  which  we  have  been 
surrounded  from  childhood.  But  we  have  no 
minute  information  respecting  those  years  of  John- 
son's life  during  which  his  character  and  his  man- 
ners became  immutably  fixed.  We  know  him,  not 
as  he  was  known  to  the  men  of  his  own  generation, 
but  as  he  was  known  to  men  whose  father  he  might 
have  been.  That  celebrated  club  of  which  he  was 
the  most  distinguished  member  contained  few  per- 
sons who  could  remember  a  time  when  his  fame 
was  not  fully  established  and  his  habits  completely 
formed.  He  had  made  himself  a  name  in  literature 
while  Reynolds  and  the  Wartons  were  still  boys. 
He  was  about  twenty  years  older  than  Burke,  Gold- 
smith, and  Gerard  Hamilton,  about  thirty  years 
older  than  Gibbon,  Beauclerk,  and  Langton,  and 
about  forty  years  older  than  Lord  Stowell,  Sir 
William  Jones,  and  Wmdham.  Boswell  and  Mrs. 
Thrale,  the  two  writers  from  whom  we  derive  most 
of  our  knowledge  respecting  him,  never  saw  him 
till  long  after  he  was  fifty  years  old,  till  most  of 
his  great  works  had  become  classical,  and  till  the 
pension  bestowed  on  him  by  the  Crown  had  placed 
him  above  poverty.  Of  those  eminent  men  who 
were  his  most  intimate  associates  towards  the  close 
of  his  life,  the  only  one,  as  far  as  we  remember, 
who  knew  him  during  the  first  ten  or  twelve  years 
of  his  residence  in  the  capital,  was  David  Garrick; 


292  Best  English  Essays 

and  it  does  not  appear  that,  during  those  years, 
David  Garrick  saw  much  of  his  fellow-townsman. 

Johnson  came  up  to  London  precisely  at  the  time 
when  the  condition  of  a  man  of  letters  was  most 
miserable  and  degraded.  It  was  a  dark  night  be- 
tween two  sunny  days.  The  age  of  patronage  had 
passed  away.  The  age  of  general  curiosity  and 
intelligence  had  not  arrived.  The  number  of 
readers  is  at  present  so  great  that  a  popular  author 
may  subsist  in  comfort  and  opulence  on  the  profits 
of  his  works.  In  the  reigns  of  William  the  Third, 
of  Anne,  and  of  George  the  First,  even  such  men 
as  Congreve  and  Addison  would  scarcely  have  been 
able  to  live  like  gentlemen  by  the  mere  sale  of  their 
writings.  But  the  deficiency  of  the  natural  demand 
for  literature  was,  at  the  close  of  the  seventeenth 
and  at  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
more  than  made  up  by  artificial  encouragement,  by 
a  vast  system  of  bounties  and  premiums.  There 
was,  perhaps,  never  a  time  at  which  the  rewards  of 
literary  merit  were  so  splendid,  at  which  men  who 
could  write  well  found  such  easy  admittance  into 
the  most  distinguished  society,  and  to  the  highest 
honours  of  the  state.  The  chiefs  of  both  the  great 
parties  into  which  the  kingdom  was  divided  patron- 
ised literature  with  emulous  munificence.  Con- 
greve, when  he  had  scarcely  attained  his  majority, 
was  rewarded  for  his  first  comedy  with  places  which 
made  him  independent  for  life.  Smith,  though  his 
Hippolytus  and  Phaedra  failed,  would  have  been 
consoled  with  three  hundred  a  year  but  for  his  own 
folly.  Rowe  was  not  only  Poet  Laureate,  but  also 
land-surveyor  of  the  customs  in  the  port  of  London, 
clerk  of  the  council  to  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  sec- 


Macau  lay  293 

retary  of  the  Presentations  to  the  Lord  Chancellor. 
Hughes  was  secretary  to  the  Commissions  of  the 
Peace.  Ambrose  Philips  was  judge  of  the  Preroga- 
tive Court  in  Ireland.  Locke  was  Commissioner  of 
Appeals  and  of  the  Board  of  Trade.  Newton  was 
Master  of  the  Mint.  Stepney  and  Prior  were  em- 
ployed in  embassies  of  high  dignity  and  importance. 
Gay,  who  commenced  life  as  apprentice  to  a  silk 
mercer,  became  a  secretary  of  legation  at  five-and- 
twenty.  It  was  to  a  poem  on  the  "  Death  of  Charles 
the  Second,"  and  to  the  "  City  and  Country  Mouse," 
that  Montague  owed  his  introduction  into  public  life, 
his  earldom,  his  garter,  and  his  Auditorship  of  the 
Exchequer.  Swift,  but  for  the  unconquerable  preju- 
dice of  the  queen,  would  have  been  a  bishop.  Ox- 
ford, with  his  white  staff  in  his  hand,  passed  through 
the  crowd  of  his  suitors  to  welcome  Parnell,  when 
that  ingenious  writer  deserted  the  Whigs.  Steele 
was  a  commissioner  of  stamps  and  a  member  of  Par- 
liament. Arthur  Mainwaring  was  a  commissioner 
of  the  customs,  and  auditor  of  the  imprest.  Tickell 
was  secretary  to  the  Lords  Justices  of  Ireland. 
Addison  was  secretary  of  state. 

This  liberal  patronage  was  brought  into  fashion, 
as  it  seems,  by  the  magnificent  Dorset,  almost  the 
only  noble  versifier  in  the  court  of  Charles  the 
Second  who  possessed  talents  for  composition  which 
were  independent  of  the  aid  of  a  coronet.  Mon- 
tague owed  his  elevation  to  the  favour  of  Dorset, 
and  imitated  through  the  whole  course  of  his  life 
the  liberality  to  which  he  was  himself  so  greatly 
indebted.  The  Tory  leaders,  Harley  and  Boling- 
broke  in  particular,  vied  with  the  chiefs  of  the  Whig 
party  in  zeal  for  the  encouragement  of  letters.  But 


294  Best  English  Essays 

soon  after  the  accession  of  the  house  of  Hanover 
a  change  took  place.  The  supreme  power  passed 
to  a  man  who  cared  little  for  poetry  or  eloquence. 
The  importance  of  the  House  of  Commons  was  con- 
stantly on  the  increase.  The  government  was  under 
the  necessity  of  bartering  for  Parliamentary  support 
much  of  that  patronage  which  had  been  employed  in 
fostering  literary  merit;  and  Walpole  was  by  no 
means  inclined  to  divert  any  part  of  the  fund  of  cor- 
ruption to  purposes  which  he  considered  as  idle. 
He  had  eminent  talents  for  government  and  for 
debate.  But  he  had  paid  little  attention  to  books, 
and  felt  little  respect  for  authors.  One  of  the  coarse 
jokes  of  his  friend,  Sir  Charles  Hanbury  Williams, 
was  far  more  pleasing  to  him  than  Thomson's 
"  Seasons  "  or  Richardson's  "  Pamela."  He  had  ob- 
served that  some  of  the  distinguished  writers  whom 
the  favour  of  Halifax  had  turned  into  statesmen  had 
been  mere  incumbrances  to  their  party,  dawdlers  in 
office,  and  mutes  in  Parliament.  During  the  whole 
course  of  his  administration,  therefore,  he  scarcely 
befriended  a  single  man  of  genius.  The  best  writers 
of  the  age  gave  all  their  support  to  the  opposition, 
and  contributed  to  excite  that  discontent  which, 
after  plunging  the  nation  into  a  foolish  and  unjust 
war,  overthrew  the  minister  to  make  room  for  men 
less  able  and  equally  immoral.  The  opposition 
could  reward  its  eulogists  with  little  more  than 
promises  and  caresses.  St.  James's  would  give 
nothing:  Leicester  house  had  nothing  to  give. 

Thus,  at  the  time  when  Johnson  commenced  his 
literary  career,  a  writer  had  little  to  hope  from  the 
patronage  of  powerful  individuals.  The  patronage 
of  the  public  did  not  yet  furnish  the  means  of  com- 


.     Macaulay  295 

fortable  subsistence.  The  prices  paid  by  booksellers 
to  authors  were  so  low  that  a  man  of  considerable 
talents  and  unremitting  industry  could  do  little 
more  than  provide  for  the  day  which  was  passing 
over  him.  The  lean  kine  had  eaten  up  the  fat  kine. 
The  thin  and  withered  ears  had  devoured  the  good 
ears.  The  season  of  rich  harvests  was  over,  and  the 
period  of  famine  had  begun.  All  that  is  squalid  and 
miserable  might  now  be  summed  up  in  the  word 
Poet.  That  word  denoted  a  creature  dressed  like 
a  scarecrow,  familiar  with  compters  and  spunging- 
houses,  and  perfectly  qualified  to  decide  on  the  com- 
parative merits  of  the  Common  Side  in  the  King's 
Bench  prison  and  of  Mount  Scoundrel  in  the  Fleet. 
Even  the  poorest  pitied  him ;  and  they  well  might 
pity  him.  For  if  their  condition  was  equally  abject, 
their  aspirings  were  not  equally  high,  nor  their  sense 
of  insult  equally  acute.  To  lodge  in  a  garret  up  four 
pair  of  stairs,  to  dine  in  a  cellar  among  footmen  out 
of  place,  to  translate  ten  hours  a  day  for  the  wages  of 
a  ditcher,  to  be  hunted  by  bailiffs  from  one  haunt 
of  beggary  and  pestilence  to  another,  from  Grub 
Street  to  St.  George's  Fields,  and  from  St.  George's 
Fields  to  the  alleys  behind  St.  Martin's  church,  to 
sleep  on  a  bulk  in  June  and  amidst  the  ashes  of  a 
glass-house  in  December,  to  die  in  an  hospital  and 
to  be  buried  in  a  parish  vault,  was  the  fate  of  more 
than  one  writer  who,  if  he  had  lived  thirty  years 
earlier,  would  have  been  admitted  to  the  sittings  of 
the  Kitcat  or  the  Scriblerus  club,  would  have  sat  in 
Parliament,  and  would  have  been  entrusted  with 
embassies  to  the  High  Allies ;  who,  if  he  had  lived 
in  our  time,  would  have  found  encouragement 
scarcely  less  munificent  in  Albemarle  Street  or  in 
Paternoster  Row. 


296  Best  English  Essays 

As  every  climate  has  its  peculiar  diseases,  so 
every  walk  of  life  has  its  peculiar  temptations.  The 
literary  character,  assuredly,  has  always  had  its 
share  of  faults,  vanity,  jealousy,  morbid  sensibility. 
To  these  faults  were  now  superadded  the  faults 
which  are  commonly  found  in  men  whose  livelihood 
is  precarious,  and  whose  principles  are  exposed  to 
the  trial  of  severe  distress.  All  the  vices  of  the 
gambler  and  of  the  beggar  were  blended  with  those 
of  the  author.  The  prizes  in  the  wretched  lottery 
of  book-making  were  scarcely  less  ruinous  than  the 
blanks.  If  good  fortune  came,  it  came  in  such  a 
manner  that  it  was  almost  certain  to  be  abused. 
After  months  of  starvation  and  despair,  a  full  third 
night  or  a  well-received  dedication  filled  the  pocket 
of  the  lean,  ragged,  unwashed  poet  with  guineas. 
He  hastened  to  enjoy  those  luxuries  with  the  images 
of  which  his  mind  had  been  haunted  while  he  was 
sleeping  amidst  the  cinders  and  eating  potatoes  at 
the  Irish  ordinary  in  Shoe  Lane.  A  week  of  taverns 
soon  qualified  him  for  another  year  of  night-cellars. 
Such  was  the  life  of  Savage,  of  Boyse,  and  of  a 
crowd  of  others.  Sometimes  blazing  in  gold-laced 
hats  and  waistcoats  ;  sometimes  lying  in  bed  because 
their  coats  had  gone  to  pieces,  or  wearing  paper 
cravats  because  their  linen  was  in  pawn ;  sometimes 
drinking  Champagne  and  Tokay-  with  Betty  Care- 
less; sometimes  standing  at  the  window  of  an 
eating-house  in  Porridge  island,  to  snuff  up  the 
scent  of  what  they  could  not  afford  to  taste;  they 
knew  luxury ;  they  knew  beggary ;  but  they  never 
knew  comfort.  These  men  were  irreclaimable. 
They  looked  on  a  regular  and  frugal  life  with  the 
same  aversion  which  an  old  gipsy  or  a  Mohawk 


Macaulay  297 

hunter  feels  for  a  stationary  abode,  and  for  the 
restraints  and  securities  of  civilised  communities. 
They  were  as  untamable,  as  much  wedded  to  their 
desolate  freedom,  as  the  wild  ass.  They  could  no 
more  be  broken  in  to  the  offices  of  social  man  than 
the  unicorn  could  be  trained  to  serve  and  abide  by 
the  crib.  It  was  well  if  they  did  not,  like  beasts  of 
a  still  fiercer  race,  tear  the  hands  which  ministered 
to  their  necessities.  To  assist  them  was  impossible ; 
and  the  most  benevolent  of  mankind  at  length  be- 
came weary  of  giving-  relief  which  was  dissipated 
with  the  wildest  profusion  as  soon  as  it  had  been 
received.  If  a  sum  was  bestowed  on  the  wretched 
adventurer,  such  as,  properly  husbanded,  might 
have  supplied  him  for  six  months,  it  was  instantly 
spent  in  strange  freaks  of  sensuality,  and,  before 
forty-eight  hours  had  elapsed,  the  poet  was  again 
pestering-  all  his  acquaintance  for  twopence  to  get 
a  plate  of  shin  of  beef  at  a  subterraneous  cook-shop. 
If  his  friends  gave  him  an  asylum  in  their  houses, 
those  houses  were  forthwith  turned  into  bagnios 
and  taverns.  All  order  was  destroyed ;  all  business 
was  suspended.  The  most  good-natured  host  began 
to  repent  of  his  eagerness  to  serve  a  man  of  genius 
in  distress  when  he  heard  his  guest  roaring  for  fresh 
punch  at  five  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

A  few  eminent  writers  were  more  fortunate. 
Pope  had  been  raised  above  poverty  by  the  active 
patronage  which,  in  his  youth,  both  the  great  politi- 
cal parties  had  extended  to  his  "  Homer."  Young 
had  received  the  only  pension  ever  bestowed,  to  the 
best  of  our  recollection,  by  Sir  Robert  Walpole,  as 
the  reward  of  mere  literary  merit.  One  or  two  of 
the  many  poets  who  attached  themselves  to  the  oppo- 


298  Best  English  Essays 

sition,  Thomson  in  particular  and  Mallet,  obtained, 
after  much  severe  suffering,  the  means  of  subsist- 
ence from  their  political  friends.  Richardson,  like 
a  man  of  sense,  kept  his  shop ;  and  his  shop  kept 
him,  which  his  novels,  admirable  as  they  are,  would 
scarcely  have  done.  But  nothing  could  be  more 
deplorable  than  the  state  even  of  the  ablest  men, 
who  at  that  time  depended  for  subsistence  on  their 
writings.  Johnson,  Collins,  Fielding,  and  Thomson, 
were  certainly  four  of  the  most  distinguished  per- 
sons that  England  produced  during  the  eighteenth 
century.  It  is  well  known  that  they  were  all  four 
arrested  for  debt. 

Into  calamities  and  difficulties  such  as  these  John- 
son plunged  in  his  twenty-eighth  year.  From  that 
time,  till  he  was  three  or  four  and  fifty,  we  have 
little  information  respecting  him ;  little,  we  mean, 
compared  with  the  full  and  accurate  information 
which  we  possess  respecting  his  proceedings  and 
habits  towards  the  close  of  his  life.  He  emerged  at 
length  from  cock-lofts  and  sixpenny  ordinaries  into 
the  society  of  the  polished  and  the  opulent.  His 
fame  was  established.  A  pension  sufficient  for  his 
wants  had  been  conferred  on  him :  and  he  came 
forth  to  astonish  a  generation  with  which  he  had 
almost  as  little  in  common  as  with  Frenchmen  or 
Spaniards. 

In  his  early  years  he  had  occasionally  seen  the 
great ;  but  he  had  seen  them  as  a  beggar.  He  now 
came  among  them  as  a  companion.  The  demand 
for  amusement  and  instruction  had,  during  the 
course  of  twenty  years,  been  gradually  increasing. 
The  price  of  literary  labour  had  risen ;  and  those 
rising  men  of  letters  with  whom  Johnson  was  hence- 


Macaulay  299 

forth  to  associate,  were  for  the  most  part  persons 
widely  different  from  those  who  had  walked  about 
with  him  all  night  in  the  streets  for  want  of  a  lodg- 
ing. Burke,  Robertson,  the  Wartons,  Gray,  Mason, 
Gibbon,  Adam  Smith,  Beattie,  Sir  William  Jones, 
Goldsmith,  and  Churchill,  were  the  most  distin- 
guished writers  of  what  may  be  called  the  second 
generation  of  the  Johnsonian  age.  Of  these  men 
Churchill  was  the  only  one  in  whom  we  can  trace 
the  stronger  lineaments  of  that  character  which, 
when  Johnson  first  came  up  to  London,  was  com- 
mon among  authors.  Of  the  rest,  scarcely  any  had 
felt  the  pressure  of  severe  poverty.  Almost  all  had 
been  early  admitted  into  the  most  respectable  society 
on  an  equal  footing.  They  were  men  of  quite  a 
different  species  from  the  dependents  of  Curll  and 
Osborne. 

Johnson  came  among  them  the  solitary  specimen 
of  a  past  age,  the  last  survivor  of  the  genuine  race 
of  Grub  Street  hacks ;  the  last  of  that  generation  of 
authors  whose  abject  misery  and  whose  dissolute 
manners  had  furnished  inexhaustible  matter  to  the 
satirical  genius  of  Pope.  From  nature  he  had  re- 
ceived an  uncouth  figure,  a  diseased  constitution, 
and  an  irritable  temper.  The  manner  in  which  the 
earlier  years  of  his  manhood  had  been  passed  had 
given  to  his  demeanour,  and  even  to  his  moral  char- 
acter, some  peculiarities  appalling  to  the  civilised 
beings  who  were  the  companions  of  his  old  age. 
The  perverse  irregularity  of  his  hours,  the  slovenli- 
ness of  his  person,  his  fits  of  strenuous  exertion, 
interrupted  by  long  intervals  of  sluggishness,  his 
strange  abstinence,  and  his  equally  strange  voracity, 
his  active  benevolence,  contrasted  with  the  constant 


300  Best  English  Essays 

rudeness  and  the  occasional  ferocity  of  his  manners 
in  society,  made  him,  in  the  opinion  of  those  with 
whom  he  lived  during  the  last  twenty  years  of  his 
life,  a  complete  original.  An  original  he  was,  un- 
doubtedly, in  some  respects.  But  if  we  possessed 
full  information  concerning  those  who  shared  his 
early  hardships,  we  should  probably  find  that  what 
we  call  his  singularities  of  manner  were,  for  the 
most  part,  failings  which  he  had  in  common  with 
the  class  to  which  he  belonged.  He  ate  at  Streatham 
Park  as  he  had  been  used  to  eat  behind  the  screen 
at  St.  John's  Gate,  when  he  was  ashamed  to  show 
his  ragged  clothes.  He  ate  as  it  was  natural  that  a 
man  should  eat,  who,  during  a  great  part  of  his  life, 
had  passed  the  morning  in  doubt  whether  he  should 
have  food  for  the  afternoon.  The  habits  of  his  early 
life  had  accustomed  him  to  bear  privation  with  for- 
titude, but  not  to  taste  pleasure  with  moderation. 
He  could  fast;  but,  when  he  did  not  fast,  he  tore 
his  dinner  like  a  famished  wolf,  with  the  veins  swell- 
ing on  his  forehead,  and  the  perspiration  running 
down  his  cheeks.  He  scarcely  ever  took  wine.  But 
when  he  drank  it,  he  drank  it  greedily  and  in  large 
tumblers.  These  were,  in  fact,  mitigated  symptoms 
of  that  same  moral  disease  which  raged  with  such 
deadly  malignity  in  his  friends  Savage  and  Boyse. 
The  roughness  and  violence  which  he  showed  in 
society  were  to  be  expected  from  a  man  whose  tem- 
per, not  naturally  gentle,  had  been  long  tried  by  the 
bitterest  calamities,  by  the  want  of  meat,  of  fire,  and 
of  clothes,  by  the  importunity  of  creditors,  by  the 
insolence  of  booksellers,  by  the  derision  of  fools, 
by  the  insincerity  of  patrons,  by  that  bread  which 
is  the  bitterest  of  all  food,  by  those  stairs  which  are 


Macaulay  301 

the  most  toilsome  of  all  paths,  by  that  deferred  hope 
which  makes  the  heart  sick.  Through  all  these 
things  the  ill-dressed,  coarse,  ungainly  pedant  had 
struggled  manfully  up  to  eminence  and  command. 
It  was  natural  that,  in  the  exercise  of  his  power, 
he  should  be  "eo  immitior,  quia  toleraverat,"  that, 
though  his  heart  was  undoubtedly  generous  and 
humane,  his  demeanour  in  society  should  be  harsh 
and  despotic.  For  severe  distress  he  had  sympathy, 
and  not  only  sympathy,  but  munificent  relief.  But 
for  the  suffering  which  a  harsh  word  inflicts  upon 
a  delicate  mind  he  had  no  pity ;  for  it  was  a  kind  of 
suffering  which  he  could  scarcely  conceive.  He 
would  carry  home  on  his  shoulders  a  sick  and  starv- 
ing girl  from  the  streets.  He  turned  his  house  into 
a  place  of  refuge  for  a  crowd  of  wretched  old  crea- 
tures who  could  find  no  other  asylum ;  nor  could 
all  their  peevishness  and  ingratitude  weary  out  his 
benevolence.  But  the  pangs  of  wounded  vanity 
seemed  to  him  ridiculous ;  and  he  scarcely  felt  suffi- 
cient compassion  even  for  the  pangs  of  wounded 
affection.  He  had  seen  and  felt  so  much  of  sharp 
misery,  that  he  was  not  affected  by  paltry  vexations ; 
and  he  seemed  to  think  that  every  body  ought  to  be 
as  much  hardened  to  those  vexations  as  himself.  He 
was  angry  with  Boswell  for  complaining  of  a  head- 
ache, with  Mrs.  Thrale  for  grumbling  about  the 
dust  on  the  road,  or  the  smell  of  the  kitchen.  These 
were,  in  his  phrase,  "  foppish  lamentations,"  which 
people  ought  to  be  ashamed  to  utter  in  a  world  so 
full  of  sin  and  sorrow.  Goldsmith  crying  because 
the  "  Good-natured  Man  "  had  failed,  inspired  him 
with  no  pity.  Though  his  own  health  was  not  good, 
he  detested  and  despised  valetudinarians.  Pecuni- 


302  Best  English  Essays 

ary  losses,  unless  they  reduced  the  loser  absolutely 
to  beggary,  moved  him  very  little.  People  whose 
hearts  had  been  softened  by  prosperity  might  weep, 
he  said,  for  such  events ;  but  all  that  could  be  ex- 
pected of  a  plain  man  was  not  to  laugh.  He  was 
not  much  moved  even  by  the  spectacle  of  Lady 
Tavistock  dying  of  a  broken  heart  for  the  loss  of 
her  lord.  Such  grief  he  considered  as  a  luxury  re- 
served for  the  idle  and  the  wealthy.  A  washer- 
woman, left  a  widow  with  nine  small  children, 
would  not  have  sobbed  herself  to  death. 

A  person  who  troubled  himself  so  little  about 
small  or  sentimental  grievances  was  not  likely  to 
be  very  attentive  to  the  feelings  of  others  in  the 
ordinary  intercourse  of  society.  He  could  not  under- 
stand how  a  sarcasm  or  a  reprimand  could  make  any 
man  really  unhappy.  "  My  dear  doctor,"  said  he 
to  Goldsmith,  "  what  harm  does  it  do  to  a  man  to 
call  him  Holofernes?"  "Pooh,  ma'am,"  he  ex- 
claimed to  Mrs.  Carter,  "  who  is  the  worse  for 
being  talked  of  uncharitably  ?  "  Politeness  has  been 
well  defined  as  benevolence  in  small  things.  John- 
son was  impolite,  not  because  he  wanted  benevo- 
lence, but  because  small  things  appeared  smaller 
to  him  than  to  people  who  had  never  known  what 
it  was  to  live  for  fourpence  halfpenny  a  day. 

The  characteristic  peculiarity  of  his  intellect  was 
the  union  of  great  powers  with  low  prejudices.  If 
we  judged  of  him  by  the  best  parts  of  his  mind,  we 
should  place  him  almost  as  high  as  he  was  placed 
by  the  idolatry  of  Boswell ;  if  by  the  worst  parts  of 
his  mind,  we  should  place  him  even  below  Boswell 
himself.  Where  he  was  not  under  the  influence  of 
some  strange  scruple,  or  some  domineering  passion, 


Macau  lay  303 

which  prevented  him  from  boldly  and  fairly  inves- 
tigating a  subject,  he  was  a  wary  and  acute  reasoner, 
a  little  too  much  inclined  to  scepticism,  and  a  little 
too  fond  of  paradox.  No  man  was  less  likely  to  be 
imposed  upon  by  fallacies  in  argument,  or  by  ex- 
aggerated statements  of  fact.  But  if,  while  he  was 
beating  down  sophisms  and  exposing  false  testi- 
mony, some  childish  prejudices,  such  as  would  ex- 
cite laughter  in  a  well-managed  nursery,  came  across 
him,  he  was  smitten  as  if  by  enchantment.  His 
mind  dwindled  away  under  the  spell  from  gigantic 
elevation  to  dwarfish  littleness.  Those  who  had 
lately  been  admiring  its  amplitude  and  its  force 
were  now  as  much  astonished  at  its  strange  narrow- 
ness and  feebleness  as  the  fisherman  in  the  Arabian 
tale,  when  he  saw  the  Genie,  whose  stature  had 
overshadowed  the  whole  sea-coast,  and  whose  might 
seemed  equal  to  a  contest  with  armies,  contract  him- 
self to  the  dimensions  of  his  small  prison,  and  lie 
there  the  helpless  slave  of  the  charm  of  Solomon. 

Johnson  was  in  the  habit  of  sifting  with  extreme 
severity  the  evidence  for  all  stories  which  were 
merely  odd.  But  when  they  were  not  only  odd  but 
miraculous,  his  severity  relaxed.  He  began  to  be 
credulous  precisely  at  the  point  where  the  most 
credulous  people  begin  to  be  sceptical.  It  is  curious 
to  observe,  both  in  his  writings  and  in  his  conver- 
sation, the  contrast  between  the  disdainful  manner 
in  which  he  rejects  unauthenticated  anecdotes,  even 
when  they  are  consistent  with  the  general  laws  of 
nature,  and  the  respectful  manner  in  which  he  men- 
tions the  wildest  stories  relating  to  the  invisible 
world.  A  man  who  told  him  of  a  water-spout,  or 
a  meteoric  stone,  generally  had  the  lie  direct  given 


304  Best  English  Essays 

him  for  his  pains.  A  man  who  told  him  of  a  pre- 
diction or  a  dream  wonderfully  accomplished  was 
sure  of  a  courteous  hearing.  "  Johnson,"  observed 
Hogarth,  "  like  King  David,  says  in  his  haste  that 
all  men  are  liars."  "  His  incredulity,"  says  Mrs. 
Thrale,  "  amounted  almost  to  disease."  She  tells 
us  how  he  browbeat  a  gentleman  who  gave  him  an 
account  of  a  hurricane  in  the  West  Indies,  and  a 
poor  quaker  who  related  some  strange  circumstance 
about  the  red-hot  balls  fired  at  the  siege  of  Gibraltar. 
"  It  is  not  so.  It  cannot  be  true.  Don't  tell  that 
story  again.  You  cannot  think  how  poor  a  figure 
you  make  in  telling  it."  He  once  said,  half  jest- 
ingly, we  suppose,  that  for  six  months  he  refused 
to  credit  the  fact  of  the  earthquake  at  Lisbon,  and 
that  he  still  believed  the  extent  of  the  calamity  to 
be  greatly  exaggerated.  Yet  he  related  with  a  grave 
face  how  old  Mr.  Cave  of  St.  John's  Gate  saw  a 
ghost,  and  how  this  ghost  was  something  of  a 
shadowy  being.  He  went  himself  on  a  ghost-hunt 
to  Cock  Lane,  and  was  angry  with  John  Wesley  for 
not  following  up  another  scent  of  the  same  kind 
with  proper  spirit  and  perseverance.  He  rejects 
the  Celtic  genealogies  and  poems  without  the  least 
hesitation ;  yet  he  declares  himself  willing  to  believe 
the  stories  of  the  second  sight.  If  he  had  examined 
the  claims  of  the  Highland  seers  with  half  the 
severity  with  which  he  sifted  the  evidence  for  the 
genuineness  of  Fingal,  he  would,  we  suspect,  have 
come  away  from  Scotland  with  a  mind  fully  made 
up.  In  his  "  Lives  of  the  Poets  "  we  find  that  he  is 
unwilling  to  give  credit  to  the  accounts  of  Lord 
Roscommon's  early  proficiency  in  his  studies :  but 
he  tells  with  great  solemnity  an  absurd  romance 


Macaulay  305 

about  some  intelligence  preternaturally  impressed 
on  the  mind  of  that  nobleman.  He  avows  himself 
to  be  in  great  doubt  about  the  truth  of  the  story, 
and  ends  by  warning  his  readers  not  wholly  to  slight 
such  impressions. 

Many  of  his  sentiments  on  religious  subjects  are 
worthy  of  a  liberal  and  enlarged  mind.  He  could 
discern  clearly  enough  the  folly  and  meanness  of  all 
bigotry  except  his  own.  When  he  spoke  of  the 
scruples  of  the  Puritans,  he  spoke  like  a  person  who 
had  really  obtained  an  insight  into  the  divine  philos- 
ophy of  the  New  Testament,  and  who  considered 
Christianity  as  a  noble  scheme  of  government,  tend- 
ing to  promote  the  happiness  and  to  elevate  the 
moral  nature  of  man.  The  horror  which  the  sec- 
taries felt  for  cards,  Christmas  ale,  plum-porridge, 
mince-pies,  and  dancing  bears,  excited  his  contempt. 
To  the  arguments  urged  by  some  very  worthy  people 
against  showy  dress  he  replied  with  admirable 
sense  and  spirit,  "  Let  us  not  be  found,  when  our 
Master  calls  us,  stripping  the  lace  off  our  waist- 
coats, but  the  spirit  of  contention  from  our  souls 
and  tongues.  Alas!  sir,  a  man  who  cannot  get  to 
heaven  in  a  green  coat  will  not  find  his  way  thither 
the  sooner  in  a  gray  one."  Yet  he  was  himself  under 
the  tyranny  of  scruples  as  unreasonable  as  those  of 
Hudibras  or  Ralpho,  and  carried  his  zeal  for  cere- 
monies and  for  ecclesiastical  dignities  to  lengths  al- 
together inconsistent  with  reason  or  with  Christian 
charity.  He  has  gravely  noted  down  in  his  diary 
that  he  once  committed  the  sin  of  drinking  coffee  on 
Good  Friday.  In  Scotland,  he  thought  it  his  duty 
to  pass  several  months  without  joining  in  public 
worship,  solely  because  the  ministers  of  the  kirk 

20 


306  Best  English  Essays 

had  nqt  been  ordained  by  bishops.  His  mode  of 
estimating  the  piety  of  his  neighbours  was  some- 
what singular.  "  Campbell,"  said  he,  "  is  a  good 
man,  a  pious  man.  I  am  afraid  he  has  not  been  in 
the  inside  of  a  church  for  many  years :  but  he  never 
passes  a  church  without  pulling  off  his  hat ;  this 
shows  he  has  good  principles."  Spain  and  Sicily 
must  surely  contain  many  pious  robbers  and  well- 
principled  assassins.  Johnson  could  easily  see  that 
a  roundhead  who  named  all  his  children  after 
Solomon's  singers,  and  talked  in  the  House  of 
Commons  about  seeking  the  Lord,  might  be  an  un- 
principled villain,  whose  religious  mummeries  only 
aggravated  his  guilt.  But  a  man  who  took  off  his 
hat  when  he  passed  a  church  episcopally  consecrated 
must  be  a  good  man,  a  pious  man,  a  man  of  good 
principles.  Johnson  could  easily  see  that  those  per- 
sons who  looked  on  a  dance  or  a  laced  waistcoat  as 
sinful,  deemed  most  ignobly  of  the  attributes  of 
God  and  of  the  ends  of  revelation.  But  with  what 
a  storm  of  invective  he  would  have  overwhelmed 
any  man  who  had  blamed  him  for  celebrating  the 
redemption  of  mankind  with  sugarless  tea  and  but- 
terless  buns ! 

Nobody  spoke  more  contemptuously  of  the  cant 
of  patriotism.  Nobody  saw  more  clearly  the  error 
of  those  who  regarded  liberty,  not  as  a  means,  but 
as  an  end,  and  who  proposed  to  themselves,  as  the 
object  of  their  pursuit,  the  prosperity  of  the  state 
as  distinct  from  the  prosperity  of  the  individuals 
who  compose  the  state.  His  calm  and  settled 
opinion  seems  to  have  been  that  forms  of  govern- 
ment have  little  or  no  influence  on  the  happiness  of 
society.  This  opinion,  erroneous  as  it  is,  ought  at 


Macaulay  307 

least  to  have  preserved  him  from  all  intemperance 
on  political  questions.  It  did  not,  however,  pre- 
serve him  from  the  lowest,  fiercest,  and  most  absurd 
extravagances  of  party  spirit,  from  rants  which,  in 
every  thing  but  the  diction,  resembled  those  of 
Squire  Western.  He  was,  as  a  politician,  half  ice 
and  half  fire.  On  the  side  of  his  intellect  he  was  a 
mere  Pococurante,  far  too  apathetic  about  public 
affairs,  far  too  sceptical  as  to  the  good  or  evil  tend- 
ency of  any  form  of  polity.  His  passions,  on  the 
contrary,  were  violent  even  to  slaying  against  all 
who  leaned  to  Whiggish  principles.  The  well- 
known  lines  which  he  inserted  in  Goldsmith's 
"  Traveller  "  express  what  seems  to  have  been  his 
deliberate  judgment: 

"  How  small,  of  all  that  human  hearts  endure, 
That  part  which  kings  or  laws  can  cause  or  cure  I " 

He  had  previously  put  expressions  very  similar  into 
the  mouth  of  Rasselas.  It  is  amusing  to  contrast 
these  passages  with  the  torrents  of  raving  abuse 
which  he  poured  forth  against  the  Long  Parliament 
and  the  American  Congress.  In  one  of  the  conver- 
sations reported  by  Boswell  this  inconsistency  dis- 
plays itself  in  the  most  ludicrous  manner. 

"  Sir  Adam  Ferguson,"  says  Boswell,  "  suggested 
that  luxury  corrupts  a  people,  and  destroys  the  spirit 
of  liberty.  JOHNSON  :  '  Sir,  that  is  all  visionary. 
I  would  not  give  half  a  guinea  to  live  under  one 
form  of  government  rather  than  another.  It  is  of 
no  moment  to  the  happiness  of  an  individual.  Sir, 
the  danger  of  the  abuse  of  power  is  nothing  to  a 
private  man.  What  Frenchman  is  prevented  pass- 


308  Best  English  Essays 

ing  his  life  as  he  pleases  ? '  SIR  ADAM  :  '  But,  sir, 
in  the  British  constitution  it  is  surely  of  importance 
to  keep  up  a  spirit  in  the  people,  so  as  to  preserve 
a  balance  against  the  crown.'  JOHNSON  :  '  Sir,  I 
perceive  you  are  a  vile  Whig.  Why  all  this  childish 
jealousy  of  the  power  of  the  crown?  The  crown 
has  not  power  enough.' " 

One  of  the  old  philosophers,  Lord  Bacon  tells  us, 
used  to  say  that  life  and  death  were  just  the  same  to 
him.  "  Why  then,"  said  an  objector,  "  do  you  not 
kill  yourself?"  The  philosopher  answered,  "Be- 
cause it  is  just  the  same."  If  the  difference  between 
two  forms  of  government  be  not  worth  half  a 
guinea,  it  is  not  easy  to  see  how  Whiggism  can  be 
viler  than  Toryism,  or  how  the  crown  can  have  too 
little  power.  If  the  happiness  of  individuals  is  not 
affected  by  political  abuses,  zeal  for  liberty  is  doubt- 
less ridiculous.  But  zeal  for  monarchy  must  be 
equally  so.  No  person  could  have  been  more  quick- 
sighted  than  Johnson  to  such  a  contradiction  as 
this  in  the  logic  of  an  antagonist. 

The  judgments  which  Johnson  passed  on  books 
were,  in  his  own  time,  regarded  with  superstitious 
veneration,  and,  in  our  time,  are  generally  treated 
with  indiscriminate  contempt.  They  are  the  judg- 
ments of  a  strong  but  enslaved  understanding.  The 
mind  of  the  critic  was  hedged  round  by  an  unin- 
terrupted fence  of  prejudices  and  superstitions. 
Within  his  narrow  limits,  he  displayed  a  vigour  and 
an  activity  which  ought  to  have  enabled  him  to  clear 
the  barrier  that  confined  him. 

How  it  chanced  that  a  man  who  reasoned  on  his 
premises  so  ably,  should  assume  his  premises  so 
foolishly,  is  one  of  the  great  mysteries  of  human 


Macau  lay  309 

nature.  The  same  inconsistency  may  be  observed 
in  the  schoolmen  of  the  middle  ages.  Those  writers 
show  so  much  acuteness  and  force  of  mind  in  argu- 
ing on  their  wretched  data,  that  a  modern  reader 
is  perpetually  at  a  loss  to  comprehend  how  such 
minds  came  by  such  data.  Not  a  flaw  in  the  super- 
structure of  the  theory  which  they  are  rearing  es- 
capes their  vigilance.  Yet  they  are  blind  to  the 
obvious  unsoundness  of  the  foundation.  It  is  the 
same  with  some  eminent  lawyers.  Their  legal  argu- 
ments are  intellectual  prodigies,  abounding  with 
the  happiest  analogies  and  the  most  refined  distinc- 
tions. The  principles  of  their  arbitrary  science  being 
once  admitted,  the  statute-book  and  the  reports 
being  once  assumed  as  the  foundations  of  reason- 
ing, these  men  must  be  allowed  to  be  perfect  masters 
of  logic.  But  if  a  question  arises  as  to  the  postu- 
lates on  which  their  whole  system  rests,  if  they  are 
called  upon  to  vindicate  the  fundamental  maxims 
of  that  system  which  they  have  passed  their  lives 
in  studying,  these  very  men  often  talk  the  language 
of  savages  or  of  children.  Those  who  have  listened 
to  a  man  of  this  class  in  his  own  court,  and  who 
have  witnessed  the  skill  with  which  he  analyses  and 
digests  a  vast  mass  of  evidence,  or  reconciles  a 
crowd  of  precedents  which  at  first  sight  seem  con- 
tradictory, scarcely  know  him  again  when,  a  few 
hours  later,  they  hear  him  speaking  on  the  other 
side  of  Westminster  Hall  in  his  capacity  of  legis- 
lator. They  can  scarcely  believe  that  the  paltry 
quirks  which  are  faintly  heard  through  a  storm  of 
coughing,  and  which  do  not  impose  on  the  plainest 
country  gentleman,  can  proceed  from  the  same 
sharp  and  vigorous  intellect  which  had  excited  their 


Best  English  Essays 

admiration  under  the  same  roof,  and  on  the  same 
day. 

Johnson  decided  literary  questions  like  a  lawyer, 
not  like  a  legislator.  He  never  examined  founda- 
tions where  a  point  wa$  already  ruled.  His  whole 
code  of  criticism  rested  on  pure  assumption,  for 
which  he  sometimes  quoted  a  precedent  or  an 
authority,  but  rarely  troubled  himself  to  give  a 
reason  drawn  from  the  nature  of  things.  He  took 
it  for  granted  that  the  kind  of  poetry  which  flour- 
ished in  his  own  time,  which  he  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  hear  praised  from  his  childhood,  and  which 
he  had  himself  written  with  success,  was  the  best 
kind  of  poetry.  In  his  biographical  work  he  has 
repeatedly  laid  it  down  as  an  undeniable  proposi- 
tion that  during  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  and  the  earlier  part  of  the  eighteenth,  Eng- 
lish poetry  had  been  in  a  constant  progress  of  im- 
provement. Waller,  Denham,  Dryden,  and  Pope, 
had  been,  according  to  him,  the  great  reformers. 
He  judged  of  all  works  of  the  imagination  by  the 
standard  established  among  his  own  contemporaries. 
Though  he  allowed  Homer  to  have  been  a  greater 
man  than  Virgil,  he  seems  to  have  thought  the 
"  ^neid  "  a  greater  poem  than  the  "  Iliad."  Indeed 
he  well  might  have  thought  so;  for  he  preferred 
Pope's  "  Iliad  "  to  Homer's.  He  pronounced  that, 
after  Hoole's  translation  of  "  Tasso,"  Fairfax's 
would  hardly  be  reprinted.  He  could  see  no  merit 
in  our  fine  old  English  ballads,  and  always  spoke 
with  the  most  provoking  contempt  of  Percy's  fond- 
ness for  them.  Of  the  great  original  works  of 
imagination  which  appeared  during  his  time,  Rich- 
ardson's novels  alone  excited  his  admiration.  He 


Macaulay  311 

could  see  little  or  no  merit  in  "  Tom  Jones,"  in 
"  Gulliver's  Travels,"  or  in  "  Tristram  Shandy."  To 
Thomson's  "  Castle  of  Indolence "  he  vouchsafed 
only  a  line  of  cold  commendation,  of  commendation 
much  colder  than  what  he  has  bestowed  on  the 
"  Creation  "  of  that  portentous  bore,  Sir  Richard 
Blackmore.  Gray  was,  in  his  dialect,  a  barren  ras- 
cal. Churchill  was  a  blockhead.  The  contempt 
which  he  felt  for  the  trash  of  Macpherson  was  in- 
deed just;  but  it  was,  we  suspect,  just  by  chance. 
He  despised  the  "Fingal"  for  the  very  reason  which 
led  many  men  of  genius  to  admire  it.  He  despised 
it,  not  because  it  was  essentially  commonplace,  but 
because  it  had  a  superficial  air  of  originality. 

He  was  undoubtedly  an  excellent  judge  of  com- 
positions fashioned  on  his  own  principles.  But 
when  a  deeper  philosophy  was  required,  when  he 
undertook  to  pronounce  judgment  on  the  works  of 
those  great  minds  which  "  yield  homage  only  to 
eternal  laws,"  his  failure  was  ignominious.  He 
criticised  "  Pope's  Epitaphs  "  excellently.  But  his 
observations  on  Shakespeare's  plays  and  Milton's 
poems  seem  to  us  for  the  most  part  as  wretched  as 
if  they  had  been  written  by  Rymer  himself,  whom 
we  take  to  have  been  the  worst  critic  that  ever  lived. 

Some  of  Johnson's  whims  on  literary  subjects 
can  be  compared  only  to  that  strange  nervous  feel- 
ing which  made  him  uneasy  if  he  had  not  touched 
every  post  between  the  Mitre  tavern  and  his  own 
lodgings.  His  preference  of  Latin  epitaphs  to 
English  epitaphs  is  an  instance.  An  English  epi- 
taph, he  said,  would  disgrace  Smollett.  He  declared 
that  he  would  not  pollute  the  walls  of  Westminster 
Abbey  with  an  English  epitaph  on  Goldsmith. 


312  Best  English  Essays 

What  reason  there  can  be  for  celebrating  a  British 
writer  in  Latin,  which  there  was  not  for  covering 
the  Roman  arches  of  triumph  with  Greek  inscrip- 
tions, or  for  commemorating  the  deeds  of  the  heroes 
of  Thermopylae  in  Egyptian  hieroglyphics,  we  are 
utterly  unable  to  imagine. 

On  men  and  manners,  at  least  on  the  men  and 
manners  of  a  particular  place  and  a  particular  age, 
Johnson  had  certainly  looked  with  a  most  observant 
and  discriminating  eye.  His  remarks  on  the  edu- 
cation of  children,  on  marriage,  on  the  economy  of 
families,  on  the  rules  of  society,  are  always  striking, 
and  generally  sound.  In  his  writings,  indeed,  the 
knowledge  of  life  which  he  possessed  in  an  eminent 
degree  is  very  imperfectly  exhibited.  Like  those 
unfortunate  chiefs  of  the  middle  ages  who  were 
suffocated  by  their  own  chain-mail  and  cloth  of 
gold,  his  maxims  perish  under  that  load  of  words 
which  was  designed  for  their  defence  and  their, 
ornament.  But  it  is  clear  from  the  remains  of  his 
conversation,  that  he  had  more  of  that  homely 
wisdom  which  nothing  but  experience  and  observa- 
tion can  give  than  any  writer  since  the  time  of  Swift. 
If  he  had  been  content  to  write  as  he  talked,  he 
might  have  left  books  on  the  practical  art  of  living 
superior  to  the  "  Directions  to  Servants." 

Yet  even  his  remarks  on  society,  like  his  remarks 
on  literature,  indicate  a  mind  at  least  as  remarkable 
for  narrowness  as  for  strength.  He  was  no  master 
of  the  great  science  of  human  nature.  He  had 
studied,  not  the  genus  man,  but  the  species  Lon- 
doner. Nobody  was  ever  so  thoroughly  conversant 
with  all  the  forms  of  life  and  all  the  shades  of  moral 
and  intellectual  character  which  were  to  be  seen 


Macaulay  313 

from  Islington  to  the  Thames,  and  from  Hyde- 
Park  corner  to  Mile-end  green.  But  his  philosophy 
stopped  at  the  first  turnpike-gate.  Of  the  rural  life 
of  England  he  knew  nothing;  and  he  took  it  for 
granted  that  every  body  who  lived  in  the  country 
was  either  stupid  or  miserable.  "  Country  gentle- 
men," said  he,  "  must  be  unhappy ;  for  they  have 
not  enough  to  keep  their  lives  in  motion  " ;  as  if  all 
those  peculiar  habits  and  associations  which  made 
Fleet  Street  and  Charing  Cross  the  finest  views  in 
the  world  to  himself  had  been  essential  parts  of 
human  nature.  Of  remote  countries  and  past  times 
he  talked  with  wild  and  ignorant  presumption. 
"  The  Athenians  of  the  age  of  Demosthenes,"  he 
said  to  Mrs.  Thrale,  "  were  a  people  of  brutes,  a 
barbarous  people."  In  conversation  with  Sir  Adam 
Ferguson  he  used  similar  language.  "  The  boasted 
Athenians,"  he  said,  "  were  barbarians.  The  mass 
of  every  people  must  be  barbarous  where  there  is 
no  printing."  The  fact  was  this:  he  saw  that  a 
Londoner  who  could  not  read  was  a  very  stupid 
and  brutal  fellow :  he  saw  that  great  refinement  of 
taste  and  activity  of  intellect  were  rarely  found  in 
a  Londoner  who  had  not  read  much ;  and,  because 
it  was  by  means  of  books  that  people  acquired  al- 
most all  their  knowledge  in  the  society  with  which 
he  was  acquainted,  he  concluded,  in  defiance  of  the 
strongest  and  clearest  evidence,  that  the  human 
mind  can  be  cultivated  by  means  of  books  alone. 
An  Athenian  citizen  might  possess  very  few  vol- 
umes ;  and  the  largest  library  to  which  he  had  access 
might  be  much  less  valuable  than  Johnson's  book- 
case in  Bolt  Court.  But  the  Athenian  might  pass 
every  morning  in  conversation  with  Socrates,  and 


314  Best  English  Essays 

might  hear  Pericles  speak  four  or  five  times  every 
month.  He  saw  the  plays  of  Sophocles  and  Aris- 
tophanes :  he  walked  amid  the  friezes  of  Phidias 
and  the  paintings  of  Zeuxis :  he  knew  by  heart  the 
choruses  of  yEschylus  :  he  heard  the  rhapsodist  at  the 
corner  of  the  street  reciting  the  "Shield  of  Achilles" 
or  the  "  Death  of  Argus  "  :  he  was  a  legislator,  con- 
versant with  high  questions  of  alliance,  revenue,  and 
war:  he  was  a  soldier,  trained  under  a  liberal  and 
generous  discipline:  he  was  a  judge  compelled 
every  day  to  weigh  the  effect  of  opposite  arguments. 
These  things  were  in  themselves  an  education,  an 
education  eminently  fitted,  not,  indeed,  to  form 
exact  or  profound  thinkers,  but  to  give  quickness 
to  the  perceptions,  delicacy  to  the  taste,  fluency  to 
the  expression,  and  politeness  to  the  manners.  All 
this  was  overlooked.  An  Athenian  who  did  not 
improve  his  mind  by  reading  was,  in  Johnson's 
opinion,  much  such  a  person  as  a  Cockney  who 
made  his  mark,  much  such  a  person  as  black  Frank 
before  he  went  to  school,  and  far  inferior  to  a 
parish  clerk  or  a  printer's  devil. 

Johnson's  friends  have  allowed  that  he  carried 
to  a  ridiculous  extreme  his  unjust  contempt  for 
foreigners.  He  pronounced  the  French  to  be  a  very 
silly  people,  much  behind  us,  stupid,  ignorant  crea- 
tures. And  this  judgment  he  formed  after  having 
been  at  Paris  about  a  month,  during  which  he  would 
not  talk  French,  for  fear  of  giving  the  natives  an  ad- 
vantage over  him  in  conversation.  He  pronounced 
them,  also,  to  be  an  indelicate  people,  because  a 
French  footman  touched  the  sugar  with  his  fingers. 
That  ingenious  and  amusing  traveller,  M.  Simond, 
has  defended  his  countrymen  very  successfully 


Macau  lay  315 

against  Johnson's  accusation,  and  has  pointed  out 
some  English  practices  which,  to  an  impartial  spec- 
tator, would  seem  at  least  as  inconsistent  with 
physical  cleanliness  and  social  decorum  as  those 
which  Johnson  so  bitterly  reprehended.  To  the 
sage,  as  Boswell  loves  to  call  him,  it  never  occurred 
to  doubt  that  there  must  be  something  eternally  and 
immutably  good  in  the  usages  to  which  he  had  been 
accustomed.  In  fact,  Johnson's  remarks  on  society 
beyond  the  bills  of  mortality,  are  generally  of  much 
the  same  kind  with  those  of  honest  Tom  Dawson, 
the  English  footman  in  Dr.  Moore's  "  Zeluco." 
"  Suppose  the  king  of  France  has  no  sons,  but  only 
a  daughter,  then,  when  the  king  dies,  this  here 
daughter,  according  to  that  there  law,  cannot  be 
made  queen,  but  the  next  near  relative,  provided  he 
is  a  man,  is  made  king,  and  not  the  last  king's 
daughter,  which,  to  be  sure,  is  very  unjust.  The 
French  footguards  are  dressed  in  blue,  and  all  the 
marching  regiments  in  white,  which  has  a  very  fool- 
ish appearance  for  soldiers;  and  as  for  blue  regi- 
mentals, it  is  only  fit  for  the  blue  horse  or  the 
artillery." 

Johnson's  visit  to  the  Hebrides  introduced  him 
to  a  state  of  society  completely  new  to  him ;  and  a 
salutary  suspicion  of  his  own  deficiencies  seems  on 
that  occasion  to  have  crossed  his  mind  for  the  first 
time.  He  confessed,  in  the  last  paragraph  of  his 
"  Journey,"  that  his  thoughts  on  national  manners 
were  the  thoughts  of  one  who  had  seen  but  little,  of 
one  who  had  passed  his  time  almost  wholly  in  cities. 
This  feeling,  however,  soon  passed  away,  It  is  re- 
markable that  to  the  last  he  entertained  a  fixed  con- 
tempt for  all  those  modes  of  life  and  those  studies 


316  Best  English  Essays 

which  tend  to  emancipate  the  mind  from  the  preju- 
dices of  a  particular  age  or  a  particular  nation.  Of 
foreign  travel  and  of  history  he  spoke  with  the  fierce 
and  boisterous  contempt  of  ignorance.  "  What  does 
a  man  learn  by  travelling?  Is  Beauclerk  the  better 
for  travelling?  What  did  Lord  Charlemont  learn 
in  his  travels,  except  that  there  was  a  snake  in  one 
of  the  pyramids  of  Egypt  ?  "  History  was,  in  his 
opinion,  to  use  the  fine  expression  of  Lord  Plunkett, 
an  old  almanack:  historians  could,  as  he  conceived, 
claim  no  higher  dignity  than  that  of  almanack- 
makers  ;  and  his  favourite  historians  were  those 
who,  like  Lord  Hailes,  aspired  to  no  higher  dignity. 
He  always  spoke  with  contempt  of  Robertson. 
Hume  he  would  not  even  read.  He  affronted  one 
of  his  friends  for  talking  to  him  about  Catiline's 
conspiracy,  and  declared  that  he  never  desired  to 
hear  of  the  Punic  war  again  as  long  as  he  lived. 

Assuredly  one  fact  which  does  not  directly  affect 
our  own  interests,  considered  in  itself,  is  no  better 
worth  knowing  than  another  fact.  The  fact  that 
there  is  a  snake  in  a  pyramid,  or  the  fact  that  Han- 
nibal crossed  the  Alps,  are  in  themselves  as  un- 
profitable to  us  as  the  fact  that  there  is  a  green  blind 
in  a  particular  house  in  Threadneedle  Street,  or  the 
fact  that  a  Mr.  Smith  comes  into  the  city  every 
morning  on  the  top  of  one  of  the  Blackwall  stages. 
But  it  is  certain  that  those  who  will  not  crack  the 
shell  of  history  will  never  get  at  the  kernel.  John- 
son, with  hasty  arrogance,  pronounced  the  kernel 
worthless,  because  he  saw  no  value  in  the  shell. 
The  real  use  of  travelling  to  distant  countries  and 
of  studying  the  annals  of  past  times  is  to  preserve 
men  from  the  contraction  of  mind  which  those  can 


Macaulay  317 

hardly  escape  whose  whole  communion  is  with  one 
generation  and  one  neighbourhood,  who  arrive  at 
conclusions  by  means  of  an  induction  not  sufficiently 
copious,  and  who  therefore  constantly  confound 
exceptions  with  rules,  and  accidents  with  essential 
properties.  In  short,  the  real  use  of  travelling  and 
of  studying  history  is  to  keep  men  from  being  what 
Tom  Dawson  was  in  fiction,  and  Samuel  Johnson  in 
reality. 

Johnson,  as  Mr.  Burke  most  justly  observed,  ap- 
pears far  greater  in  Boswell's  books  than  in  his 
own.  His  conversation  appears  to  have  been  quite 
equal  to  his  writings  in  matter,  and  far  superior  to 
them  in  manner.  When  he  talked,  he  clothed  his 
wit  and  his  sense  in  forcible  and  natural  expres- 
sions. As  soon  as  he  took  his  pen  in  his  hand  to 
write  for  the  public,  his  style  became  systematically 
vicious.  All  his  books  are  written  in  a  learned  lan- 
guage, in  a  language  which  nobody  hears  from  his 
mother  or  his  nurse,  in  a  language  in  which  nobody 
ever  quarrels,  or  drives  bargains,  or  makes  love,  in 
a  language  in  which  nobody  ever  thinks.  It  is  clear 
that  Johnson  himself  did  not  think  in  the  dialect  in 
which  he  wrote.  The  expressions  which  came  first 
to  his  tongue  were  simple,  energetic,  and  pictur- 
esque. When  he  wrote  for  publication,  he  did  his 
sentences  out  of  English  into  Johnsonese.  His 
letters  from  the  Hebrides  to  Mrs.  Thrale  are  the 
original  of  that  work  of  which  the  "  Journey  to  the 
Hebrides  "  is  the  translation ;  and  it  is  amusing  to 
compare  the  two  versions.  "  When  we  were  taken 
up  stairs,"  says  he  in  one  of  his  letters,  "  a  dirty 
fellow  bounced  out  of  the  bed  on  which  one  of  us 
was  to  lie."  This  incident  is  recorded  in  the  "  Jour- 


318  Best  English  Essays 

ney  "  as  follows :  "  Out  of  one  of  the  beds  on  which 
we  were  to  repose  started  up,  at  our  entrance,  a 
man  black  as  a  Cyclops  from  the  forge."  Some- 
times Johnson  translated  aloud.  "  The  Rehearsal," 
he  said,  very  unjustly,  "  has  not  wit  enough  to  keep 
it  sweet " ;  then',  after  a  pause,  "  it  has  not  vitality 
enough  to  preserve  it  from  putrefaction." 

Mannerism  is  pardonable,  and  is  sometimes  even 
agreeable,  when  the  manner,  though  vicious,  is 
natural.  Few  readers,  for  example,  would  be  will- 
ing to  part  with  the  mannerism  of  Milton  or  of 
Burke.  But  a  mannerism  which  does  not  sit  easy 
on  the  mannerist,  which  has  been  adopted  on  prin- 
ciple, and  which  can  be  sustained  only  by  constant 
effort,  is  always  offensive.  And  such  is  the  man- 
nerism of  Johnson. 

The  characteristic  faults  of  his  style  are  so 
familiar  to  all  our  readers,  and  have  been  so  often 
burlesqued,  that  it  is  almost  superfluous  to  point 
them  out.  It  is  well  known  that  he  made  less  use 
than  any  other  eminent  writer  of  those  strong  plain 
words,  Anglo-Saxon  or  Norman-French,  of  which 
the  roots  lie  in  the  inmost  depths  of  our  language; 
and  that  he  felt  a  vicious  partiality  for  terms  which, 
long  after  our  own  speech  had  been  fixed,  were 
borrowed  from  the  Greek  and  Latin,  and  which, 
therefore,  even  when  lawfully  naturalised,  must  be 
considered  as  born  aliens,  not  entitled  to  rank  with 
the  king's  English.  His  constant  practice  of  pad- 
ding out  a  sentence  with  useless  epithets,  till  it 
became  as  stiff  as  the  bust  of  an  exquisite,  his  anti- 
thetical forms  of  expression,  constantly  employed 
even  where  there  is  no  opposition  in  the  ideas  ex- 
pressed, his  big  words  wasted  on  little  things,  his 


,  Macaulay  319 

harsh  inversions,  so  widely  different  from  those 
graceful  and  easy  inversions  which  give  variety, 
spirit,  and  sweetness  to  the  expression  of  our  great 
old  writers,  all  these  peculiarities  have  been  imitated 
by  his  admirers  and  parodied  by  his  assailants,  till 
the  public  has  become  sick  of  the  subject. 

Goldsmith  said  to  him,  very  wittily  and  very 
justly,  "If  you  were  to  write  a  fable  about  little 
fishes,  doctor,  you  would  make  the  little  fishes  talk 
like  whales."  No  man  surely  ever  had  so  little 
talent  for  personation  as  Johnson.  Whether  he 
wrote  in  the  character  of  a  disappointed  legacy- 
hunter  or  an  empty  town  fop,  of  a  crazy  virtuoso  or 
a  flippant  coquette,  he  wrote  in  the  same  pompous 
and  unbending  style.  His  speech,  like  Sir  Piercy 
Shafton's  Euphuistic  eloquence,  bewrayed  him 
under  every  disguise.  Euphelia  and  Rhodoclea 
talk  as  finely  as  Imlac  the  poet,  or  Seged,  Emperor 
of  Ethiopia.  The  gay  Cornelia  describes  her  recep- 
tion at  the  country-house  of  her  relations,  in  such 
terms  as  these :  "  I  was  surprised,  after  the  civilities 
of  my  first  reception,  to  find,  instead  of  the  leisure 
and  tranquillity  which  a  rural  life  always  promises, 
and,  if  well  conducted,  might  always  afford,  a  con- 
fused wildness  of  care,  and  a  tumultuous  hurry  of 
diligence,  by  which  every  face  was  clouded,  and 
every  motion  agitated."  The  gentle  Tranquilla  in- 
forms us,  that  she  "  had  not  passed  the  earlier  part 
of  life  without  the  flattery  of  courtship,  and  the  joys 
of  triumph;  but  had  danced  the  round  of  gaiety 
amidst  the  murmurs  of  envy  and  the  gratulations 
of  applause,  had  been  attended  from  pleasure  to 
pleasure  by  the  great,  the  sprightly,  and  the  vain, 
and  had  seen  her  regard  solicited  by  the  obsequious- 


Best  English  Essays 

ness  of  gallantry,  the  gaiety  of  wit,  and  the  timidity 
of  love."  Surely  Sir  John  Falstaff  himself  did  not 
wear  his  petticoats  with  a  worse  grace.  The  reader 
may  well  cry  out,  with  honest  Sir  Hugh  Evans, 
"  I  like  not  when  a  'oman  has  a  great  peard :  I 
spy  a  great  peard  under  her  muffler."  x 

We  had  something  more  to  say.  But  our  article 
is  already  too  long;  and  we  must  close  it.  We 
would  fain  part  in  good  humour  from  the  hero,  from 
the  biographer,  and  even  from  the  editor,  who,  ill 
as  he  has  performed  his  task,  has  at  least  this  claim 
to  our  gratitude,  that  he  has  induced  us  to  read 
Boswell's  book  again.  As  we  close  it,  the  club- 
room  is  before  us,  and  the  table  on  which  stands 
the  omelet  for  Nugent,  and  the  lemons  for  Johnson. 
There  are  assembled  those  heads  which  live  for  ever 
on  the  canvas  of  Reynolds.  There  are  the  spec- 
tacles of  Burke  and  the  tall  thin  form  of  Langton, 
the  courtly  sneer  of  Beauclerk  and  the  beaming 
smile  of  Garrick,  Gibbon  tapping  his  snuff-box  and 
Sir  Joshua  with  his  trumpet  in  his  ear.  In  the 
foreground  is  that  strange  figure  which  is  as  famil- 
iar to  us  as  the  figures  of  those  among  whom  we 
have  been  brought  up,  the  gigantic  body,  the  huge 
massy  face,  seamed  with  the  scars  of  disease,  the 
brown  coat,  the  black  worsted  stockings,  the  grey 
wig  with  the  scorched  foretop,  the  dirty  hands,  the 
nails  bitten  and  pared  to  the  quick.  We  see  the 
eyes  and  mouth  moving  with  convulsive  twitches ; 
we  see  the  heavy  form  rolling;  we  hear  it  puffing; 
and  then  comes  the  "  Why,  sir !  "  and  the  "  What 

1  It  is  proper  to  observe  that  this  passage  bears  a  very  close 
resemblance  to  a  passage  in  the  "Rambler"  (No.  20).  The  re- 
semblance may  possibly  be  the  effect  of  unconscious  plagiarism. 


Macaulay  321 

then,  sir?  "  and  the  "  No,  sir!  "  and  the  "  You  don't 
see  your  way  through  the  question,  sir !  " 

What  a  singular  destiny  has  been  that  of  this 
remarkable  man !  To  be  regarded  in  his  own  age 
as  a  classic,  and  in  ours  as  a  companion.  To  re- 
ceive from  his  contemporaries  that  full  homage 
which  men  of  genius  have  in  general  received  only 
from  posterity!  To  be  more  intimately  known  to 
posterity  than  other  men  are  known  to  their  con- 
temporaries !  That  kind  of  fame  which  is  commonly 
the  most  transient  is,  in  his  case,  the  most  durable. 
The  reputation  of  those  writings,  which  he  prob- 
ably expected  to  be  immortal,  is  every  day  fading; 
while  those  peculiarities  of  manner  and  that  care- 
less table-talk  the  memory  of  which,  he  probably 
thought,  would  die  with  him,  are  likely  to  be  re- 
membered as  long  as  the  English  language  is  spoken 
in  any  quarter  of  the  globe. 


THE   PERFECT   HISTORIAN 
(Essay  on  History) 

THE  perfect  historian  is  he  in  whose  work  the 
character  and  spirit  of  an  age  is  exhibited  in 
miniature.  He  relates  no  facts,  he  attributes  no  ex- 
pression to  his  characters,  which  is  not  authenticated 
by  sufficient  testimony.  But,  by  judicious  selection, 
rejection,  and  arrangement,  he  gives  to  truth  those 
attractions  which  have  been  usurped  by  fiction.  In 
his  narrative  a  due  subordination  is  observed :  some 
transactions  are  prominent ;  others  retire.  But  the 
scale  on  which  he  represents  them  is  increased  or 


322  Best  English  Essays 

diminished,  not  according  to  the  dignity  of  the  per- 
sons concerned  in  them,  but  according  to  the  degree 
in  which  they  elucidate  the  condition  of  society  and 
the  nature  of  man.  He  shows  us  the  court,  the 
camp,  and  the  senate.  But  he  shows  us  also  the 
nation.  He  considers  no  anecdote,  no  peculiarity 
of  manner,  no  familiar  saying,  as  too  insignificant 
for  his  notice  which  is  not  too  insignificant  to  illus- 
trate the  operation  of  laws,  of  religion,  and  of 
education,  and  to  mark  the  progress  of  the  human 
mind.  Men  will  not  merely  be  described,  but  will 
be  made  intimately  known  to  us.  The  changes  of 
manners  will  be  indicated,  not  merely  by  a  few 
general  phrases  or  a  few  extracts  from  statistical 
documents,  but  by  appropriate  images  presented 
in  every  line. 

If  a  man,  such  as  we  are  supposing,  should  write 
the  history  of  England,  he  would  assuredly  not  omit 
the  battles,  the  sieges,  the  negotiations,  the  seditions, 
the  ministerial  changes.  But  with  these  he  would  in- 
tersperse the  details  which  are  the  charm  of  historical 
romances.  At  Lincoln  Cathedral  there  is  a  beautiful 
painted  window,  which  was  made  by  an  apprentice 
out  of  the  pieces  of  glass  which  had  been  rejected 
by  his  master.  It  is  so  far  superior  to  every  other 
in  the  church,  that,  according  to  the  tradition,  the 
vanquished  artist  killed  himself  from  mortification. 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  in  the  same  manner,  has  used 
those  fragments  of  truth  which  historians  have 
scornfully  thrown  behind  them  in  a  manner  which 
may  well  excite  their  envy.  He  has  constructed  out 
of  their  gleanings  works  which,  even  considered  as 
histories,  are  scarcely  less  valuable  than  theirs.  But 
a  truly  great  historian  would  reclaim  those  mate- 


Macaulay  323 

rials  which  the  novelist  has  appropriated.  The  his- 
tory of  the  government,  and  the  history  of  the  people, 
would  be  exhibited  in  that  mode  in  which  alone  they 
can  be  exhibited  justly,  in  inseparable  conjunction 
and  intermixture.  We  should  not  then  have  to 
look  for  the  wars  and  votes  of  the  Puritans  in 
Clarendon,  and  for  their  phraseology  in  "  Old  Mor- 
tality " ;  for  one  half  of  King  James  in  Hume,  and 
for  the  other  half  in  the  "  Fortunes  of  Nigel." 

The  early  part  of  our  imaginary  history  would 
be  rich  with  colouring  from  romance,  ballad,  and 
chronicle.  We  should  find  ourselves  in  the  company 
of  knights  such  as  those  of  Froissart,  and  of  pil- 
grims such  as  those  who  rode  with  Chaucer  from 
the  Tabard.  Society  would  be  shown  from  the 
highest  to  the  lowest,  —  from  the  royal  cloth  of 
state  to  the  den  of  the  outlaw;  from  the  throne 
of  the  legate,  to  the  chimney  corner  where  the 
begging  friar  regaled  himself.  Palmers,  minstrels, 
crusaders,  —  the  stately  monastery,  with  the  good 
cheer  in  its  refectory  and  the  high-mass  in  its 
chapel,  —  the  manor-house,  with  its  hunting  and 
hawking,  —  the  tournament,  with  the  heralds  and 
ladies,  the  trumpets  and  the  cloth  of  gold,  —  would 
give  truth  and  life  to  the  representation.  We  should 
perceive,  in  a  thousand  slight  touches,  the  impor- 
tance of  the  privileged  burgher,  and  the  fierce  and 
haughty  spirit  which  swelled  under  the  collar  of 
the  degraded  villain.  The  revival  of  letters  would 
not  merely  be  described  in  a  few  magnificent  periods. 
We  should  discern,  in  innumerable  particulars,  the 
fermentation  of  mind,  the  eager  appetite  for  knowl- 
edge, which  distinguished  the  sixteenth  from  the 
fifteenth  century.  In  the  Reformation  we  should 


324  Best  English  Essays 

see,  not  merely  a  schism  which  changed  the  ecclesi- 
astical constitution  of  England  and  the  mutual  re- 
lations of  the  European  powers,  but  a  moral  war 
which  raged  in  every  family,  which  set  the  father 
against  the  son,  and  the  son  against  the  father, 
the  mother  against  the  daughter,  and  the  daughter 
against  the  mother.  Henry  would  be  painted  with 
the  skill  of  Tacitus.  We  should  have  the  change 
of  his  character  from  his  profuse  and  joyous  youth 
to  his  savage  and  imperious  old  age.  We  should 
perceive  the  gradual  progress  of  selfish  and  tyran- 
nical passions  in  a  mind  not  naturally  insensible 
or  ungenerous ;  and  to  the  last  we  should  detect 
some  remains  of  that  open  and  noble  temper  which 
endeared  him  to  a  people  whom  he  oppressed,  strug- 
gling with  the  hardness  of  despotism  and  the  irrita- 
bility of  disease.  We  should  see  Elizabeth  in  all 
her  weakness  and  in  all  her  strength,  surrounded  by 
the  handsome  favourites  whom  she  never  trusted, 
and  the  wise  old  statesman  whom  she  never  dis- 
missed, uniting  in  herself  the  most  contradictory 
qualities  of  both  her  parents,  —  the  coquetry,  the 
caprice,  the  petty  malice  of  Anne,  —  the  haughty 
and  resolute  spirit  of  Henry.  We  have  no  hesi- 
tation in  saying  that  a  great  artist  might  produce 
a  portrait  of  this  remarkable  woman  at  least  as 
striking  as  that  in  the  novel  of  "  Kenilworth," 
without  employing  a  single  trait  not  authenticated 
by  ample  testimony.  In  the  meantime,  we  should 
see  arts  cultivated,  wealth  accumulated,  the  con- 
veniences of  life  improved.  We  should  see  the 
keeps,  where  nobles,  insecure  themselves,  spread  in- 
security around  them,  gradually  giving  place  to  the 
halls  of  peaceful  opulence,  to  the  oriels  of  Longleat, 


Macaulay  325 

and  the  stately  pinnacles  of  Burleigh.  We  should 
see  towns  extended,  deserts  cultivated,  and  hamlets 
of  fishermen  turned  into  wealthy  havens,  the  meal 
of  the  peasant  improved,  and  his  hut  more  com- 
modiously  furnished.  We  should  see  those  opinions 
and  feelings  which  produced  the  great  struggle 
against  the  house  of  Stuart  slowly  growing  up  in 
the  bosom  of  private  families,  before  they  mani- 
fested themselves  in  parliamentary  debates.  Then 
would  come  the  civil  war.  Those  skirmishes  on 
which  Clarendon  dwells  so  minutely  would  be  told, 
as  Thucydides  would  have  told  them,  with  perspic- 
uous conciseness.  They  were  merely  connecting 
links.  But  the  great  characteristics  of  the  age,  the 
loyal  enthusiasm  of  the  brave  English  gentry, 
the  fierce  licentiousness  of  the  swearing,  dicing, 
drunken  reprobates,  whose  excesses  disgraced  the 
royal  cause,  —  the  austerity  of  the  Presbyterian 
Sabbaths  in  the  city,  the  extravagance  of  the  inde- 
pendent preachers  in  the  camp,  the  precise  garb, 
the  severe  countenance,  the  petty  scruples,  the 
affected  accent,  the  absurd  names  and  phrases 
which  marked  the  Puritans, — the  valour,  the  policy, 
the  public  spirit  which  lurked  beneath  these  un- 
graceful disguises, — the  dreams  of  the  raving  Fifth- 
monarchy-man,  the  dreams,  scarcely  less  wild,  of 
the  philosophic  republican,  —  all  these  would  enter 
into  the  representation,  and  render  it  at  once  more 
exact  and  more  striking. 

The  instruction  derived  from  history  thus  written 
would  be  of  a  vivid  and  practical  character.  It 
would  be  received  by  the  imagination  as  well  as 
by  the  reason.  It  would  be  not  merely  traced  on 
the  mind,  but  branded  into  it.  Many  truths,  too, 


326  Best  English  Essays 

would  be  learned,  which  can  be  learned  in  no  other 
manner.  As  the  history  of  states  is  generally  writ- 
ten, the  greatest  and  most  momentous  revolutions 
seem  to  come  upon  them  like  supernatural  inflic- 
tions, without  warning  or  cause.  But  the  fact  is,  that 
such  revolutions  are  almost  always  the  consequences 
of  moral  changes,  which  have  gradually  passed  on 
the  mass  of  the  community,  and  which  ordinarily 
proceed  far  before  their  progress  is  indicated  by 
any  public  measure.  An  intimate  knowledge  of  the 
domestic  history  of  nations  is  therefore  absolutely 
necessary  to  the  prognosis  of  political  events.  A 
narrative,  defective  in  this  respect,  is  as  useless  as 
a  medical  treatise  which  should  pass  by  all  the 
symptoms  attendant  on  the  early  stage  of  a  disease 
and  mention  only  what  occurs  when  the  patient  is 
beyond  the  reach  of  remedies. 

A  historian,  such  as  we  have  been  attempting  to 
describe,  would  indeed  be  an  intellectual  prodigy. 
In  his  mind,  powers  scarcely  compatible  with  each 
other  must  be  tempered  into  an  exquisite  harmony. 
We  shall  sooner  see  another  Shakespeare  or  another 
Homer.  The  highest  excellence  to  which  any  single 
faculty  can  be  brought  would  be  less  surprising 
than  such  a  happy  and  delicate  combination  of  quali- 
ties. Yet  the  contemplation  of  imaginary  models 
is  not  an  unpleasant  or  useless  employment  of  the 
mind.  It  cannot  indeed  produce  perfection ;  but  it 
produces  improvement,  and  nourishes  that  generous 
and  liberal  fastidiousness  which  is  not  inconsistent 
with  the  strongest  sensibility  to  merit,  and  which, 
while  it  exalts  our  conceptions  of  the  art,  does  not 
render  us  unjust  to  the  artist. 


IX 
RUSKIN 


RUSKIN: 
THE   IMPASSIONED   CRITIC 

MATTHEW  ARNOLD  once  spoke  of 
poetry  as  "  a  criticism  of  life."  He 
might  better  have  called  it  a  personal 
interpretation  of  life.  In  the  sense  that  Mr. 
Arnold  used  the  word  criticism,  the  writings  of 
all  the  great  essay  writers  have  been  essentially 
criticisms  of  life.  Bacon's  was  an  analytic  criti- 
cism, Swift's  a  satirical  criticism,  Lamb's  a  loving- 
criticism,  and  so  on.  But  all  these  writers  chose 
for  the  most  part  subjects  which  they  could  only 
illustrate,  or  which  they  might  use  as  a  vehicle 
for  conveying  their  own  personality  or  their  view 
of  life  to  the  reader.  When  the  subject  itself  is 
the  centre  of  the  writer's  interest,  and  he  seriously 
wishes  to  analyze  or  illustrate  it,  he  becomes  a 
critic  in  the  modern  technical  sense  of  the  word. 
Ruskin  was  from  beginning  to  end  essentially 
a  critic.  He  first  undertook  in  his  "  Modern 
Painters  "  to  illustrate  and  analyze  certain  phases 
of  modern  painting.  To  accomplish  his  object 
fully  he  must  present  by  description  the  things  of 
which  he  wishes  to  speak,  or  he  must  present  by 
means  of  descriptions  certain  objects  which  he 


330  Best  English  Essays 

wishes  to  use  for  purposes  of  illustration.  It  was 
the  vividness  of  these  incidental  descriptions  that 
first  attracted  attention  to  Ruskin's  style  and  gave 
him  the  name  "  prose  poet."  To  create  "  prose 
poems,"  however,  was  farthest  from  his  own 
thought,  and  we  should  fail  to  understand  these 
"  purple  patches  "  (purpureus  pannus,  in  the  lan- 
guage of  Horace),  such,  for  example,  as  the  de- 
scription of  Turner's  "  Slave  Ship  "  at  the  end  of 
the  chapter  on  "  Sea-painting,"  should  we  sepa- 
rate them  from  their  practical  use  of  incidental 
illustration.  Ruskin  wrote  these  highly  colored 
bits  almost  unconsciously,1  we  must  believe,  and 
simply  for  the  reason  that  he  was  passionately 
interested  in  his  subject.  Being  a  man  of  pas- 
sionate devotion,  he  wrote  with  passion.  Had  he 
been  a  mere  seer  of  pictures,  he  would  have  been 
a  poet ;  but  as  he  was  a  thinker,  and  his  mind  had 
an  analytic  turn,  he  became  a  true  critic,  though 
none  the  less  passionate  because  he  wrote  criti- 
cism instead  of  poetry. 

Ruskin  began  as  a  young  man  with  art  criti- 
cism and  the  criticism  of  architecture.  His  real 
interest  was  in  nature  and  the  effect  of  art  on 
human  nature.  His  study  of  the  whole  problem 
of  the  action  of  art  on  humanity  and  humanity 
on  art  led  him  at  last  to  look  into  the  conditions 
which  made  human  beings  blind  to  art.  As  was 
always  the  case  with  him,  he  entered  upon  this 

1  We  find  the  same  picturesque  language  in  his  note-books, 
intended  merely  for  his  own  personal  reference. 


Ruskin  331 

investigation  with  passionate  interest.  It  led  him 
into  political  economy,  of  which  he  knew  little 
historically  or  philosophically;  but  he  plunged 
with  his  usual  passionate  interest  into  the  gen- 
eral subject  of  human  relations  and  especially  the 
condition  of  the  masses.  In  this  work  he  met 
many  rebuffs  and  much  discouragement.  At  last 
in  the  guise  of  a  series  of  fortnightly  letters  to 
workingmen  he  wrote  his  series  "  Fors  Clavi- 
gera,"  in  which  he  appears  as  the  satirical  though 
sympathetic  critic  of  all  phases  of  human  rela- 
tionship. Through  these  three  different  kinds  of 
writing  we  see  the  passionate  element  changing, 
but  never  disappearing.  First  it  shows  itself  as 
highly  colored  description,  then  as  daring  and 
fearless  philosophy,  at  last  as  the  bitterness  of 
satire. 

Ruskin  had  the  gift  of  a  silvery  eloquence  above 
any  other  writer  of  the  nineteenth  century.  His 
mastery  of  the  musical  element  of  language  is 
equal  in  prose  to  that  of  Tennyson  in  poetry ;  but 
whereas  Tennyson's  gifts  were  partly  acquired, 
or  at  any  rate  assiduously  cultivated,  Ruskin's 
gifts  in  this  direction  we're  largely  natural,  or 
were  developed  unconsciously  by  his  enthusiasm 
in  his  subject.  United  with  this  musical  mastery 
is  a  fine  sense  of  logical  relationship.  The  two 
qualities  together  make  such  a  simple  story  as 
"  The  King  of  the  Golden  River "  an  almost 
perfect  specimen  of  natural  prose  style.  As  a 
model  of  style,  however,  it  is  so  simple  and  so 


332  Best  English  Essays 

nearly  perfect  that  its  qualities  can  hardly  be 
perceived  by  the  ordinary  mind,  which  feels  the 
pleasing  effect,  but  fails  to  analyze  the  manner. 
To  produce  such  an  effect  is,  of  course,  the  height 
of  literary  art. 

While  Ruskin  owes  the  quality  of  his  prose 
largely  to  his  passionate  nature,  it  is  that  nature 
that  led  him  into  so  many  extravagances  and 
excesses.  One  of  these  extravagances  we  may 
see  in  the  conclusion  of  "  The  Virtues  of  Archi- 
tecture." *  We  understand  what  Ruskin  meant ; 
but  his  statement  as  it  stands  is  obviously  dis- 
torted and,  from  the  common  point  of  view,  un- 
true. It  illustrates  the  difficulties  of  writing 
perfect  prose  till  one's  own  nature  has  been  per- 
fectly subjected  to  the  experience  that  comes  with 
years  and  the  self-mastery  of  a  healthy  mind. 

1  "  I  shall  endeavour  so  to  lead  the  reader  forward  from  the 
foundation  upwards,  as  that  he  may  find  out  for  himself  the  best 
way  of  doing  everything,  and  having  so  discovered  it,  never  forget 
it.  I  shall  give  him  stones,  and  bricks,  and  straw,  chisels,  and 
trowels,  and  the  ground,  and  then  ask  him  to  build ;  only  help- 
ing him,  as  I  can,  if  I  find  him  puzzled.  And  when  he  has  built 
his  house  or  church,  I  shall  ask  him  to  ornament  it,  and  leave  it  to 
him  to  choose  the  ornaments  as  I  did  to  find  out  the  construction : 
I  shall  use  no  influence  with  him  whatever,  except  to  counteract 
previous  prejudices,  and  leave  him  as  far  as  may  be,  free.  And 
when  he  has  thus  found  out  how  to  build,  and  chosen  his  forms  of 
decoration,  I  shall  do  what  I  can  to  confirm  his  confidence  in 
what  he  has  done.  I  shall  assure  him  that  no  one  in  the  world 
could,  so  far,  have  done  better,  and  require  him  to  condemn,  as 
futile  or  fallacious,  whatever  has  no  resemblance  to  his  own 
performances." 


Ruskin  333 


SEA-PAINTING 
(Modern  Painters,  Vol.  /.) 

AS  the  right  rendering  of  the  Alps  depends  on 
power  of  drawing  snow,  so  the  right  painting 
of  the  sea  must  depend,  at  least  in  all  coast  scenery, 
in  no  small  measure  on  the  power  of  drawing  foam. 
Yet  there  are  two  conditions  of  foam  of  invariable 
occurrence  on  breaking  waves,  of  which  I  have 
never  seen  the  slightest  record  attempted;  first  the 
thick  creamy  curdling  overlapping  massy  form 
which  remains  for  a  moment  only  after  the  fall  of 
the  wave,  and  is  seen  in  perfection  in  its  running 
up  the  beach ;  and  secondly,  the  thin  white  coating 
into  which  this  subsides,  which  opens  into  oval  gaps 
and  clefts,  marbling  the  waves  over  their  whole 
surface,  and  connecting  the  breakers  on  a  flat  shore 
by  long  dragging  streams  of  white. 

It  is  evident  that  the  difficulty  of  expressing  either 
of  these  two  conditions  must  be  immense.  The 
lapping  and  curdling  form  is  difficult  enough  to 
catch  even  when  the  lines  of  its  undulation  alone 
are  considered;  but  the  lips,  so  to  speak,  which  lie 
along  these  lines,  are  full,  projecting,  and  marked 
by  beautiful  light  and  shade ;  each  has  its  high 
light,  a  gradation  into  shadow  of  indescribable 
delicacy,  a  bright  reflected  light  and  a  dark  cast 
shadow ;  to  draw  all  this  requires  labour,  and  care, 
and  firmness  of  work,  which,  as  I  imagine,  must 
always,  however  skilfully  bestowed,  destroy  all  im- 
pression of  wildness,  accidentalism,  and  evanes- 
cence, and  so  kill  the  sea.  Again,  the  openings  in 


334  Best  English  Essays 

the  thin  subsided  foam  in  their  irregular  modifica- 
tions of  circular  and  oval  shapes  dragged  hither 
and  thither,  would  be  hard  enough  to  draw  even  if 
they  could  be  seen  on  a  flat  surface;  instead  of 
which,  every  one  of  the  openings  is  seen  in  undula- 
tion on  a  tossing  surface,  broken  up  over  small 
surges  and  ripples,  and  so  thrown  into  perspectives 
of  the  most  hopeless  intricacy.  Now  it  is  not  easy 
to  express  the  lie  of  a  pattern  with  oval  openings  on 
the  folds  of  drapery.  I  do  not  know  that  any  one 
under  the  mark  of  Veronese  or  Titian  could  even 
do  this  as  it  ought  to  be  done,  yet  in  drapery  much 
stiffness  and  error  may  be  overlooked ;  not  so  in 
sea,  —  the  slightest  inaccuracy,  the  slightest  want 
of  flow  and  freedom  in  the  line,  is  attacked  by  the 
eye  in  a  moment  of  high  treason,  and  I  believe 
success  to  be  impossible. 

Yet  there  is  not  a  wave  or  any  violently  agitated 
sea  on  which  both  these  forms  do  not  appear,  —  the 
latter  especially,  after  some  time  of  storm,  extends 
over  their  whole  surfaces;  the  reader  sees,  there- 
fore, why  I  said  that  sea  could  only  be  painted  by 
means  of  more  or  less  dexterous  conventionalisms, 
since  two  of  its  most  enduring  phenomena  cannot 
be  represented  at  all. 

Again,  as  respects  the  form  of  breakers  on  an 
even  shore,  there  is  difficulty  of  no  less  formidable 
kind.  There  is  in  them  an  irreconcilable  mixture 
of  fury  and  formalism.  Their  hollow  surface  is 
marked  by  parallel  lines,  like  those  of  a  smooth  mill- 
weir,  and  graduated  by  reflected  and  transmitted 
lights  of  the  most  wonderful  intricacy,  its  curve 
being  at  the  same  time  necessarily  of  mathematical 
purity  and  precision;  yet  at  the  top  of  this  curve, 


Ruskin  335 

when  it  nods  over,  there  is  a  sudden  laxity  and 
giving  way,  the  water  swings  and  jumps  along  the 
ridge  like  a  shaken  chain,  and  the  motion  runs  from 
part  to  part  as  it  does  through  a  serpent's  body. 
Then  the  wind  is  at  work  on  the  extreme  edge,  and 
instead  of  letting  it  fling  itself  off  naturally,  it  sup- 
ports it,  and  drives  it  back,  or  scrapes  it  off,  and  car- 
ries it  bodily  away ;  so  that  the  spray  at  the  top  is 
in  a  continual  transition  between  forms  projected  by 
their  own  weight,  and  forms  blown  and  carried  off 
with  their  weight  overcome;  then  at  last,  when  it 
has  come  down,  who  shall  say  what  shape  that  may 
be  called,  which  shape  has  none  of  the  great  crash 
where  it  touches  the  beach. 

I  think  it  is  that  last  crash  which  is  the  great  task- 
master. Nobody  can  do  anything  with  it.  I  have 
seen  Copley  Fielding  come  very  close  to  the  jerk 
and  nod  of  the  lifted  threatening  edge,  curl  it  very 
successfully,  and  without  any  look  of  its  having 
been  in  papers,  down  nearly  to  the  beach,  but  the 
final  fall  has  no  thunder  in  it.  Turner  has  tried 
hard  for  it  once  or  twice,  but  it  will  not  do.  The 
moment  is  given  in  the  Sidon  of  the  Bible  Illustra- 
tions, and  more  elaborately  in  a  painting  of  Barn- 
borough  ;  in  both  these  cases  there  is  little  foam  at 
the  bottom,  and  the  fallen  breaker  looks  like  a  wall, 
yet  grand  always ;  and  in  the  latter  picture  very 
beautifully  assisted  in  expression  by  the  tossing  of 
a  piece  of  cable,  which  some  figures  are  dragging 
ashore,  and  which  the  breaker  flings  into  the  air 
as  it  falls.  Perhaps  the  most  successful  rendering 
of  the  forms  was  in  the  Hero  and  Leander,  but 
there  the  drawing  was  rendered  easier  by  the 
powerful  effect  of  light  which  disguised  the  foam. 


336  Best  English  Essays 

It  is  not,  however,  from  the  shore  that  Turner 
usually  studies  his  sea.  Seen  from  the  land,  the  curl 
of  the  breakers,  even  in  nature,  is  somewhat  uni- 
form and  monotonous ;  the  size  of  the  waves  out 
at  sea  is  uncomprehended,  and  those  nearer  the 
eye  seem  to  succeed  and  resemble  each  other,  to 
move  slowly  to  the  beach,  and  to  break  in  the  same 
lines  and  forms. 

Afloat  even  twenty  yards  from  the  shore,  we 
receive  a  totally  different  impression.  Every  wave 
around  us  appears  vast  —  every  one  different  from 
all  the  rest  —  and  the  breakers  present,  now  that 
we  see  them  with  their  backs  towards  us,  the  grand, 
extended,  and  varied  lines  of  long  curvature,  which 
are  peculiarly  expressive  both  of  velocity  and  power. 
Recklessness,  before  unfelt,  is  manifested  in  the 
mad,  perpetual,  changeful,  undirected  motion,  not 
of  wave  after  wave,  as  it  appears  from  the  shore, 
but  of  the  very  same  water  rising  and  falling.  Of 
waves  that  successively  approach  and  break,  each 
appears  to  the  mind  a  separate  individual,  whose 
part  being  performed,  it  perishes,  and  is  succeeded 
by  another;  and  there  is  nothing  in  this  to  impress 
us  with  the  idea  of  restlessness,  any  more  than  in 
any  successive  and  continuous  functions  of  life  and 
death.  But  it  is  when  we  perceive  that  it  is  no 
succession  of  wave,  but  the  same  water  constantly 
rising,  and  crashing,  and  recoiling,  and  rolling  in 
again  in  new  forms  and  with  fresh  fury,  that  we 
perceive  the  perturbed  spirit,  and  feel  the  intensity 
of  its  unwearied  rage.  The  sensation  of  power  is 
also  trebled ;  for  not  only  is  the  vastness  of  appar- 
ent size  much  increased,  but  the  whole  action  is 
different;  it  is  not  a  passive  wave  rolling  sleepily 


Ruskin  337 

forward  until  it  tumbles  heavily,  prostrated  upon 
the  beach,  but  a  sweeping  exertion  of  tremendous 
and  living  strength,  which  does  not  now  appear  to 
fall,  but  to  burst  upon  the  shore;  which  never 
perishes,  but  recoils  and  recovers. 

Aiming  at  these  grand  characters  of  the  Sea, 
Turner  almost  always  places  the  spectator,  not  on 
the  shore,  but  twenty  or  thirty  yards  from  it,  beyond 
the  first  range  of  the  breakers,  as  in  the  Land's  End, 
Fowey,  Dunbar,  and  Laugharne.  The  latter  has 
been  well  engraved,  and  may  be  taken  as  a  standard 
of  the  expression  of  fitfulness  and  power.  The 
grand  division  of  the  whole  space  of  the  sea  by  a 
few  dark  continuous  furrows  of  tremendous  swell, 
(the  breaking  of  one  of  which  alone  has  strewed 
the  rocks  in  front  with  ruin),  furnishes  us  with 
an  estimate  of  space  and  strength,  which  at  once 
reduces  the  men  upon  the  shore  to  insects ;  and  yet 
through  this  terrific  simplicity  there  is  indicated  a 
fitfulness  and  fury  in  the  tossing  of  the  individual 
lines,  which  give  to  the  whole  sea  a  wild,  unwearied, 
reckless  incoherency,  like  that  of  an  enraged  multi- 
tude, whose  masses  act  together  in  frenzy,  while 
not  one  individual  feels  as  another.  Especial  atten- 
tion is  to  be  directed  to  the  flatness  of  all  the  lines, 
for  the  same  principle  holds  in  sea  which  we  have 
seen  in  mountains.  All  the  size  and  sublimity  of 
nature  are  given  not  by  the  height,  but  by  the 
breadth  of  her  masses :  and  Turner,  by  following 
her  in  her  sweeping  lines,  while  he  does  not  lose 
the  elevation  of  its  surges,  adds  in  a  tenfold  degree 
to  their  power:  farther,  observe  the  peculiar  ex- 
pression of  weight  which  there  is  in  Turner's  waves, 
precisely  of  the  same  kind  which  we  saw  in  his 


338  Best  English  Essays 

waterfall.  We  have  not  a  cutting,  springing,  elastic 
line  —  no  jumping  or  leaping  in  the  waves :  that 
is  the  characteristic  of  Chelsea  Reach  or  Hampstead 
Ponds  in  a  storm.  But  the  surges  roll  and  plunge 
with  such  prostration  and  hurling  of  their  mass 
against  the  shore,  that  we  feel  the  rocks  are  shaking 
under  them ;  and,  to  add  yet  more  to  this  impres- 
sion, observe  how  little,  comparatively,  they  are 
broken  by  the  wind ;  above  the  floating  wood,  and 
along  the  shore,  we  have  indication  of  a  line  of  torn 
spray ;  but  it  is  a  mere  fringe  along  the  ridge  of 
the  surge  —  no  interference  with  its  gigantic  body. 
The  wind  has  no  power  over  its  tremendous  unity 
of  force  and  weight.  Finally,  observe  how,  on  the 
rocks  on  the  left,  the  violence  and  swiftness  of  the 
rising  wave  are  indicated  by  precisely  the  same  lines 
which  we  saw  were  indicative  of  fury  in  the  torrent. 
The  water  on  these  rocks  is  the  body  of  the  wave 
which  has  just  broken,  rushing  up  over  them ;  and 
in  doing  so,  like  the  torrent,  it  does  not  break,  nor 
foam,  nor  part  upon  the  rock,  but  accommodates 
itself  to  every  one  of  its  swells  and  hollows,  with 
undulating  lines,  whose  grace  and  variety  might 
alone  serve  us  for  a  day's  study;  and  it  is  only 
where  two  streams  of  this  rushing  water  meet  in 
the  hollow  of  the  rock,  that  their  force  is  shown  by 
the  vertical  bound  of  the  spray. 

In  the  distance  of  this  grand  picture,  there  are 
two  waves  which  entirely  depart  from  the  principle 
observed  by  all  the  rest,  and  spring  high  into  the 
air.  They  have  a  message  for  us  which  it  is  im- 
portant that  we  should  understand.  Their  leap  is 
not  a  preparation  for  breaking,  neither  is  it  caused 
by  their  meeting  with  a  rock.  It  is  caused  by  their 


Ruskin  339 

encounter  with  the  recoil  of  the  preceding  wave. 
When  a  large  surge,  in  the  act  of  breaking,  just 
as  it  curls  over,  is  hurled  against  the  face  either 
of  a  wall  or  of  a  vertical  rock,  the  sound  of  the  blow 
is  not  a  crash  nor  a  roar ;  it  is  a  report  as  loud  as, 
and  in  every  respect  similar  to,  that  of  a  great  gun, 
and  the  wave  is  dashed  back  from  the  rock  with 
force  scarcely  diminished,  but  reversed  in  direction, 
—  it  now  recedes  from  the  shore,  and  at  the  instant 
that  it  encounters  the  following  breaker,  the  result 
is  the  vertical  bound  of  both  which  is  here  rendered 
by  Turner.  Such  a  recoiling  wave  will  proceed 
out  to  sea  through  ten  or  twelve  ranges  of  following 
breakers,  before  it  is  overpowered.  The  effect  of 
the  encounter  is  more  completely  and  palpably  given 
in  the  Ouillebceuf,  in  the  Rivers  of  France.  It  is 
peculiarly  instructive  here,  as  informing  us  of  the 
nature  of  the  coast,  and  the  force  of  the  waves, 
far  more  clearly  than  any  spray  about  the  rocks 
themselves  could  have  done.  But  the  effect  of  the 
blow  at  the  shore  itself  is  given  in  the  Land's  End, 
and  vignette  to  Lycidas.  Under  favourable  cir- 
cumstances, with  an  advancing  tide  under  a  heavy 
gale,  where  the  breakers  feel  the  shore  underneath 
them  a  moment  before  they  touch  the  rock,  so  as 
to  nod  over  when  they  strike,  the  effect  is  nearly 
incredible  except  to  an  eye-witness.  I  have  seen 
the  whole  body  of  the  wave  rise  in  one  white,  ver- 
tical, broad  fountain,  eighty  feet  above  the  sea,  half 
of  it  beaten  so  fine  as  to  be  borne  away  by  the  wind, 
the  rest  turning  in  the  air  when  exhausted,  and 
falling  back  with  a  weight  and  crash  like  that  of  an 
enormous  waterfall.  This  is  given  most  completely 
in  the  Lycidas,  and  the  blow  of  a  less  violent  wave 


34°  Best  English  Essays 

among  broken  rocks,  not  meeting  it  with  an  abso- 
lute wall,  along  the  shore  of  the  Land's  End.  This 
last  picture  is  a  study  of  sea  whose  whole  organi- 
sation has  been  broken  up  by  constant  recoils  from 
a  rocky  coast.  The  Laugharne  gives  the  surge  and 
weight  of  the  ocean  in  a  gale,  on  a  comparatively 
level  shore ;  but  the  Land's  End,  the  entire  disorder 
of  the  surges  when  every  one  of  them,  divided  and 
entangled  among  promontories  as  it  rolls  in,  and 
beaten  back  part  by  part  from  walls  of  rock  on  this 
side  and  that  side,  recoils  like  the  defeated  division 
of  a  great  army,  throwing  all  behind  it  into  disor- 
der, breaking  up  the  succeeding  waves  into  vertical 
ridges,  which  in  their  turn,  yet  more  totally  shat- 
tered upon  the  shore,  retire  in  more  hopeless  confu- 
sion, until  the  whole  surface  of  the  sea  becomes  one 
dizzy  whirl  of  rushing,  writhing,  tortured,  undirected 
rage,  bounding,  and  crashing,  and  coiling  in  an 
anarchy  of  enormous  power,  subdivided  into  myriads 
of  waves,  of  which  every  one  is  not,  be  it  remem- 
bered, a  separate  surge,  but  part  and  portion  of  a 
vast  one,  actuated  by  internal  power,  and  giving  in 
every  direction  the  mighty  undulation  of  impetuous 
line  which  glides  over  the  rocks  and  writhes  in  the 
wind,  overwhelming  the  one,  and  piercing  the  other 
with  the  form,  fury,  and  swiftness  of  a  sheet  of  lam- 
bent fire.  And  throughout  the  rendering  of  all  this, 
there  is  not  one  false  curve  given,  not  one  which 
is  not  the  perfect  expression  of  visible  motion ;  and 
the  forms  of  the  infinite  sea  are  drawn  throughout 
with  that  utmost  mastery  of  art  which,  through  the 
deepest  study  of  every  line  makes  every  line  appear 
the  wildest  child  of  chance,  while  yet  each  is  in 
itself  a  subject  and  a  picture  different  from  all  else 


Ruskin  341 

around.  Of  the  colour  of  this  magnificent  sea  I 
have  before  spoken;  it  is  a  solemn  green  grey, 
(with  its  foam  seen  dimly  through  the  darkness  of 
twilight,)  modulated  with  the  fulness,  changeful- 
ness,  and  sadness  of  a  deep,  wild  melody. 

The  greater  number  of  Turner's  paintings  of  open 
sea  belong  to  a  somewhat  earlier  period  than  these 
drawings ;  nor,  generally  speaking,  are  they  of 
equal  value.  It  appears  to  me  that  the  artist  had  at 
that  time  either  less  knowledge  of,  or  less  delight 
in,  the  characteristics  of  deep  water  than  of  coast 
sea,  and  that,  in  consequence,  he  suffered  himself 
to  be  influenced  by  some  of  the  qualities  of  the 
Dutch  sea-painters.  In  particular,  he  borrowed 
from  them  the  habit  of  casting  a  dark  shadow  on 
the  near  waves,  so  as  to  bring  out  a  stream  of  light 
behind ;  and  though  he  did  this  in  a  more  legitimate 
way  than  they,  that  is  to  say,  expressing  the  light 
by  touches  on  the  foam,  and  indicating  the  shadow 
as  cast  on  foamy  surface,  still  the  habit  has  induced 
much  feebleness  and  conventionality  in  the  pictures 
of  the  period.  His  drawing  of  the  waves  was  also 
somewhat  petty  and  divided,  small  forms  covered 
with  white  flat  spray,  a  condition  which  I  doubt  not 
the  artist  has  seen  on  some  of  the  shallow  Dutch 
seas,  but  which  I  have  never  met  with  myself,  and 
of  the  rendering  of  which  therefore  I  cannot  speak. 
Yet  even  in  these,  which  I  think  among  the  poorest 
works  of  the  painter,  the  expressions  of  breeze, 
motion,  and  light,  are  very  marvellous;  and  it  is 
instructive  to  compare  them  either  with  the  life- 
less works  of  the  Dutch  themselves,  or  with  any 
modern  imitations  of  them,  as  for  instance  with 
the  seas  of  Callcott,  where  all  the  light  is  white 


342  Best  English  Essays 

and  all  the  shadows  grey,  where  no  distinction  is 
made  between  water  and  form,  or  between  real  and 
reflective  shadow,  and  which  are  generally  with- 
out evidence  of  the  artists  having  ever  seen  the 
sea. 

Some  pictures,  however,  belonging  to  this  period 
of  Turner  are  free  from  the  Dutch  infection,  and 
show  the  real  power  of  the  artist.  A  very  important 
one  is  in  the  possession  of  Lord  Francis  Egerton, 
somewhat  heavy  in  its  forms,  but  remarkable  for 
the  grandeur  of  distance  obtained  at  the  horizon ; 
a  much  smaller,  but  more  powerful  example  is  the 
Port  Ruysdael  in  the  possession  of  E.  Bicknell,  Esq., 
with  which  I  know  of  no  work  at  all  comparable 
for  the  expression  of  the  white,  wild,  cold,  comfort- 
less waves  of  northern  sea,  even  though  the  sea  is 
almost  subordinate  to  the  awful  rolling  clouds. 
Both  these  pictures  are  very  grey.  The  Pas  de 
Calais  has  more  colour,  and  shows  more  art  than 
either,  yet  is  less  impressive.  Recently,  two  marines 
of  the  same  subdued  colour  have  appeared  (1843) 
among  his  more  radiant  works.  One,  Ostend,  some- 
what forced  and  affected,  but  the  other,  also  called 
Port  Ruysdael,  is  among  the  most  perfect  sea  pic- 
tures he  has  produced,  and  especially  remarkable 
as  being  painted  without  one  marked  opposition 
either  of  colour  or  of  shade,  all  quiet  and  simple 
even  to  an  extreme,  so  that  the  picture  was  exceed- 
ingly unattractive  at  first  sight.  The  shadow  of  the 
pier-head  on  the  near  waves  is  marked  solely  by 
touches  indicative  of  reflected  light,  and  so  myste- 
riously that  when  the  picture  is  seen  near,  it  is  quite 
untraceable,  and  comes  into  existence  as  the  specta- 
tor retires.  It  is  thus  of  peculiar  truth  and  value; 


Ruskin  343 

and  instructive  as  a  contrast  to  the  dark  shadows  of 
his  earlier  time. 

Few  people,  comparatively,  have  ever  seen  the 
effect  on  the  sea  of  a  powerful  gale  continued  with- 
out intermission  for  three  or  four  days  and  nights, 
and  to  those  who  have  not,  I  believe  it  must  be  unim- 
aginable, not  from  the  mere  force  or  size  of  surge, 
but  from  the  complete  annihilation  of  the  limit 
between  sea  and  air.  The  water  from  its  prolonged 
agitation  is  beaten,  not  into  mere  creaming  foam, 
but  into  masses  of  accumulated  yeast,1  which  hang 

1  The  "  yesty  waves  "  of  Shakespeare  have  made  the  likeness 
familiar,  and  probably  most  readers  take  the  expression  as  merely 
equivalent  to  "foamy";  but  Shakespeare  knew  better.  Sea- 
foam  does  not,  under  ordinary  circumstances,  last  a  moment  after 
it  is  formed,  but  disappears,  as  above  described,  in  a  mere  white 
film.  But  the  foam  of  a  prolonged  tempest  is  altogether  differ- 
ent; it  is  "whipped"  foam,  —  thick,  permanent,  and,  in  a  foul  or 
discoloured  sea,  very  ugly,  especially  in  the  way  it  hangs  about  the 
tops  of  the  waves,  and  gathers  into  clotted  concretions  before 
the  driving  wind.  The  sea  looks  truly  working  or  fermenting. 
The  following  passage  from  Fenimore  Cooper  is  an  interesting 
confirmation  of  the  rest  of  the  above  description,  which  may  be 
depended  upon  as  entirely  free  from  exaggeration  :  — "  For  the 
first  time  I  now  witnessed  a  tempest  at  sea.  Gales,  and  pretty 
hard  ones,  I  had  often  seen,  but  the  force  of  the  wind  on  this 
occasion  as  much  exceeded  that  in  ordinary  gales  of  wind,  as  the 
force  of  these  had  exceeded  that  of  a  whole-sail  breeze.  The  sea 
seemed  crushed ;  the  pressure  of  the  swooping  atmosphere,  as 
the  currents  of  the  air  went  howling  over  the  surface  of  the 
ocean,  fairly  preventing"  them  from  rising;  or  where  a  mound  of 
water  did  appear,  it  was  scooped  up  and  borne  off  in  spray,  as 
the  axe  dubs  inequalities  from  the  log.  When  the  day  returned, 
a  species  of  lurid,  sombre  light  was  diffused  over  the  watery 
waste,  though  nothing  was  visible  but  the  ocean  and  the  ship. 
Even  the  sea-birds  seemed  to  have  taken  refuge  in  the  caverns  of 
the  adjacent  coast,  none  reappearing  with  the  dawn.  The  air 
was  full  of  spray,  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that  the  eye  could 


344  Best  English  Essays 

in  ropes  and  wreaths  from  wave  to  wave,  and  where 
one  curls  over  to  break,  form  a  festoon  like  a 
drapery,  from  its  edge;  these  are  taken  up  by  the 
wind,  not  in  dissipating  dust,  but  bodily,  in  writh- 
ing, hanging,  coiling  masses,  which  make  the  air 
white  and  thick  as  with  snow,  only  the  flakes  are  a 
foot  or  two  long  each;  the  surges  themselves  are 
full  of  foam  in  their  very  bodies,  underneath,  making 
them  white  all  through,  as  the  water  is  under  a  great 
cataract;  and  their  masses,  being  thus  half  water 
and  half  air,  are  torn  to  pieces  by  the  wind  when- 
ever they  rise,  and  carried  away  in  roaring  smoke, 
which  chokes  and  strangles  like  actual  water.  Add 
to  this,  that  when  the  air  has  been  exhausted  of  its 
moisture  by  long  rain,  the  spray  of  the  sea  is  caught 
by  it  as  described  above,  and  covers  its  surface  not 
merely  with  the  smoke  of  finely  divided  water,  but 
with  boiling  mist ;  imagine  also  the  low  rain-clouds 
brought  down  to  the  very  level  of  the  sea,  as  I  have 
often  seen  them,  whirling  and  flying  in  rags  and 
fragments  from  wave  to  wave;  and  finally,  conceive 
the  surges  themselves  in  their  utmost  pitch  of  power, 
velocity,  vastness,  and  madness,  lifting  themselves  in 
precipices  and  peaks,  furrowed  with  their  whirl  of 
ascent,  through  all  this  chaos;  and  you  will  under- 
stand that  there  is  indeed  no  distinction  left  between 
the  sea  and  air;  that  no  object,  nor  horizon,  nor  any 
landmark  or  natural  evidence  of  position  is  left ; 
that  the  heaven  is  all  spray,  and  the  ocean  all  cloud, 
and  that  you  can  see  no  farther  in  any  direction  than 
you  could  see  through  a  cataract.  Suppose  the 

penetrate  as  far  into  the  humid  atmosphere  as  half  a  mile."  — 
Miles  Wallingford.  Half  a  mile  is  an  over-estimate  in  coast. 
(Raskin's  note.) 


Ruskin  345 

effect  of  the  first  sunbeam  sent  from  above  to  show 
this  annihilation  to  itself,  and  you  have  the  sea  pic- 
ture of  the  Academy,  1842  —  the  snow-storm,  one 
of  the  very  grandest  statements  of  sea-motion,  mist, 
and  light  that  has  ever  been  put  on  canvas,  even  by 
Turner.  Of  course  it  was  not  understood;  his 
finest  works  never  are ;  but  there  was  some  apology 
for  the  public's  not  comprehending  this,  for  few 
people  have  had  the  opportunity  of  seeing  the  sea 
at  such  a  time,  and  when  they  have,  cannot  face  it. 
To  hold  by  a  mast  or  a  rock,  and  watch  it  is  a  pro- 
longed endurance  of  drowning  which  few  people 
have  courage  to  go  through.  To  those  who  have, 
it  is  one  of  the  noblest  lessons  of  nature. 

But,  I  think,  the  noblest  sea  that  Turner  has  ever 
painted,  and,  if  so,  the  noblest  certainly  ever  painted 
by  man,  is  that  of  the  Slave  Ship,  the  chief  Academy 
picture  of  the  exhibition  of  1840.  It  is  a  sunset  on 
the  Atlantic  after  prolonged  storm ;  but  the  storm  is 
partially  lulled,  and  the  torn  and  streaming  rain- 
clouds  are  moving  in  scarlet  lines  to  lose  themselves 
in  the  hollow  of  the  night.  The  whole  surface  of 
sea  included  in  the  picture  is  divided  into  two  ridges 
of  enormous  swell,  not  high,  nor  local,  but  a  low, 
broad  heaving  of  the  whole  ocean,  like  the  lifting 
of  its  bosom  by  deep-drawn  breath  after  the  torture 
of  the  storm.  Between  these  two  ridges,  the  fire  of 
the  sunset  falls  along  the  trough  of  the  sea,  dye- 
ing it  with  an  awful  but  glorious  light,  the  intense 
and  lurid  splendour  which  burns  like  gold  and 
bathes  like  blood.  Along  this  fiery  path  and  valley, 
the  tossing  waves  by  which  the  swell  of  the  sea  is 
restlessly  divided,  lift  themselves  in  dark,  indefinite, 
fantastic  forms,  each  casting  a  faint  and  ghastly 


346  Best  English  Essays 

shadow  behind  it  along  the  illumined  foam.  They 
do  not  rise  everywhere,  but  three  or  four  together  in 
wild  groups,  fitfully  and  furiously,  as  the  under 
strength  of  the  swell  compels  or  permits  them ; 
leaving  between  them  treacherous  spaces  of  level 
and  whirling  water,  now  lighted  with  green  and 
lamp-like  fire,  now  flashing  back  the  gold  of  the 
declining  sun,  now  fearfully  dyed  from  above  with 
the  indistinguishable  images  of  the  burning  clouds, 
which  fall  upon  them  in  flakes  of  crimson  and  scar- 
let, and  give  to  the  reckless  waves  the  added  motion 
of  their  own  fiery  flying.  Purple  and  blue,  the  lurid 
shadows  of  the  hollow  breakers  are  cast  upon  the 
mist  of  the  night,  which  gathers  cold  and  low, 
advancing  like  the  shadow  of  death  upon  the  guilty  l 
ship  as  it  labours  amidst  the  lightning  of  the  sea, 
its  thin  masts  written  upon  the  sky  in  lines  of  blood, 
girded  with  condemnation  in  that  fearful  hue  which 
signs  the  sky  with  horror,  and  mixes  its  flaming 
flood  with  the  sunlight,  —  and  cast  far  along  the 
desolate  heave  of  the  sepulchral  waves,  incarnadines 
the  multitudinous  sea. 

I  believe,  if  I  were  reduced  to  rest  Turner's  im- 
mortality upon  any  single  work,  I  should  choose 
this.  Its  daring  conception  —  ideal  in  the  highest 
sense  of  the  word  —  is  based  on  the  purest  truth, 
and  wrought  out  with  the  concentrated  knowledge 
of  a  life;  its  colour  is  absolutely  perfect,  not  one 
false  or  morbid  hue  in  any  part  or  line,  and  so  mod- 
ulated that  every  square  inch  of  canvas  is  a  perfect 
composition ;  its  drawing  as  accurate  as  fearless ; 
the  ship  buoyant,  bending,  and  full  of  motion;  its 

1  She  is  a  slaver,  throwing  her  slaves  overboard.  The  near 
sea  is  encumbered  with  corpses.  (Ruskin's  note.) 


Ruskin  347 

tones  as  true  as  they  are  wonderful ; 1  and  the  whole 
picture  dedicated  to  the  most  sublime  of  subjects 
and  impressions — (completing  thus  the  perfect 
system  of  all  truth,  which  we  have  shown  to  be 
formed  by  Turner's  works)  — the  power,  majesty, 
and  deathfulness  of  the  open,  deep,  illimitable  Sea. 


THE  VIRTUES  OF  ARCHITECTURE 
(Stones  of  Venice,  Vol.  II.) 

WE  address  ourselves  first  to  the  task  of  de- 
termining some  law  of  right  which  we  may 
apply  to  the  architecture  of  all  the  world  and  of  all 
time;  and  by  help  of  which,  and  judgment  accord- 
ing to  which,  we  may  easily  pronounce  whether  a 
building  is  good  or  noble,  as,  by  applying  a  plumb- 
line,  whether  it  be  perpendicular. 

1  There  is  a  piece  of  tone  of  the  same  kind,  equal  in  one  part, 
but  not  so  united  with  the  rest  of  the  picture,  in  the  storm  scene 
illustrative  of  the  "Antiquary,"  —  a  sunset  light  on  polished  sea. 
I  ought  to  have  particularly  mentioned  the  sea  in  the  Lowestoffe, 
as  a  piece  of  the  cutting  motion  of  shallow  water,  under  storm, 
altogether  in  grey,  which  should  be  especially  contrasted,  as  a 
piece  of  colour,  with  the  greys  of  Vandevelde.  And  the  sea  in  the 
Great  Yarmouth  should  have  been  noticed  for  its  expression  of 
water  in  violent  agitation,  seen  in  enormous  extent  from  a  great 
elevation.  There  is  almost  every  form  of  sea  in  it,  —  rolling 
waves  dashing  on  the  pier  —  successive  breakers  rolling  to  the 
shore  —  a  vast  horizon  of  multitudinous  waves  —  and  winding 
canals  of  calm  water  along  the  sands,  bringing  fragments  of 
bright  sky  down  into  their  yellow  waste.  There  is  hardly  one  of 
the  views  of  the  Southern  Coast  which  does  not  give  some  new 
condition  or  circumstance  of  sea.  (Ruskin's  note.) 


348  Best  English  Essays 

The  first  question  will  of  course  be,  What  are  the 
possible  Virtues  of  architecture? 

In  the  main,  we  require  from  buildings,  as  from 
men,  two  kinds  of  goodness:  first,  the  doing  their 
practical  duty  well:  then  that  they  be  graceful 
and  pleasing  in  doing  it ;  which  last  is  itself  another 
form  of  duty. 

Then  the  practical  duty  divides  itself  into  two 
branches,  —  acting  and  talking :  —  acting,  as  to 
defend  us  from  weather  or  violence ;  talking,  as  the 
duty  of  monuments  or  tombs,  to  record  facts  and 
express  feelings ;  or  of  churches,  temples,  public 
edifices,  treated  as  books  of  history,  to  tell  such 
history  clearly  and  forcibly. 

We  have  thus,  altogether,  three  great  branches 
of  architectural  virtue,  and  we  require  of  any 
building,  — 

1.  That  it  act  well,  and  do  the  things  it  was 
intended  to  do  in  the  best  way. 

2.  That  it  speak  well,  and  say  the  things  it  was 
intended  to  say  in  the  best  words. 

3.  That  it  look  well,  and  please  us  by  its  presence, 
whatever  it  has  to  do  or  say. 

Now,  as  regards  the  second  of  these  virtues,  it  is 
evident  that  we  can  establish  no  general  laws.  First, 
because  it  is  not  a  virtue  required  in  all  buildings ; 
there  are  some  which  are  only  for  covert  or  defence, 
and  from  which  we  ask  no  conversation.  Secondly, 
because  there  are  countless  methods  of  expression, 
some  conventional,  some  natural :  each  conventional 
mode  has  its  own  alphabet,  which  evidently  can  be 
no  subject  of  general  laws.  Every  natural  mode  is 
instinctively  employed  and  instinctively  understood, 
wherever  there  is  true  feeling;  and  this  instinct  is 


Ruskin  349 

above  law.  The  choice  of  conventional  methods 
depends  on  circumstances  out  of  calculation,  and 
that  of  natural  methods  on  sensations  out  of  con- 
trol ;  so  that  we  can  only  say  that  the  choice  is  right, 
when  we  feel  that  the  means  are  effective;  and  we 
cannot  always  say  that  it  is  wrong  when  they  are 
not  so. 

A  building  which  recorded  the  Bible  history  by 
means  of  a  series  of  sculptural  pictures,  would  be 
perfectly  useless  to  a  person  unacquainted  with  the 
Bible  beforehand;  on  the  other  hand,  the  text  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments  might  be  written  on 
its  walls,  and  yet  the  building  be  a  very  inconven- 
ient kind  of  book,  not  so  useful  as  if  it  had  been 
adorned  with  intelligible  and  vivid  sculpture.  So, 
again,  the  power  of  exciting  emotion  must  vary  or 
vanish,  as  the  spectator  becomes  thoughtless  or  cold ; 
and  the  building  may  be  often  blamed  for  what  is 
the  fault  of  its  critic,  or  endowed  with  a  charm 
which  is  of  its  spectator's  creation.  It  is  not,  there- 
fore, possible  to  make  expressional  character  any 
fair  criterion  of  excellence  in  buildings,  until  we  can 
fully  place  ourselves  in  the  position  of  those  to 
whom  their  expression  was  originally  addressed, 
and  until  we  are  certain  that  we  understand  every 
symbol,  and  are  capable  of  being  touched  by  every 
association  which  its  builders  employed  as  letters 
of  their  language.  I  shall  continually  endeavour 
to  put  the  reader  into  such  sympathetic  temper, 
when  I  ask  for  his  judgment  of  a  building;  and 
in  every  work  I  may  bring  before  him  I  shall  point 
out,  as  far  as  I  am  able,  whatever  is  peculiar  in  its 
expression ;  nay,  I  must  even  depend  on  such  pe- 
culiarities for  much  of  my  best  evidence  respecting 


350  Best  English  Essays 

the  character  of  the  builders.  But  I  cannot  legalise 
the  judgment  for  which  I  plead,  nor  insist  upon  it 
if  it  be  refused.  I  can  neither  force  the  reader  to 
feel  this  architectural  rhetoric,  nor  compel  him  to 
confess  that  the  rhetoric  is  powerful,  if  it  have  pro- 
duced no  impression  on  his  own  mind. 

I  leave,  therefore,  the  expression  of  buildings  for 
incidental  notice  only.  But  their  other  two  virtues 
are  proper  subjects  of  law,  —  their  performance  of 
their  common  and  necessary  work,  and  their  con- 
formity with  universal  and  divine  canons  of  love- 
liness: respecting  these  there  can  be  no  doubt,  no 
ambiguity.  I  would  have  the  reader  discern  them, 
so  quickly  that,  as  he  passes  along  a  street,  he 
may,  by  a  glance  of  the  eye  distinguish  the  noble 
from  the  ignoble  work.  He  can  do  this,  if  he  permit 
free  play  to  his  natural  instincts ;  and  all  that  I  have 
to  do  for  him  is  to  remove,  from  those  instincts  the 
artificial  restraints  which  prevent  their  action,  and 
to  encourage  them  to  an  unaffected  and  unbiassed 
choice  between  right  and  wrong. 

We  have,  then,  two  qualities  of  buildings  for  sub- 
jects of  separate  inquiry:  their  action,  and  aspect, 
and  the  sources  of  virtue  in  both ;  that  is  to  say, 
Strength  and  Beauty,  both  of  these  being  less  ad- 
mired in  themselves,  than  as  testifying  the  intelli- 
gence or  imagination  of  the  builder. 

For  we  have  a  worthier  way  of  looking  at  human 
than  at  divine  architecture :  much  of  the  value  both 
of  construction  and  decoration,  in  the  edifices  of 
men,  depends  upon  our  being  led  by  the  thing  pro- 
duced or  adorned,  to  some  contemplation  of  the 
powers  of  mind  concerned  in  its  creation  or  adorn- 
ment. We  are  not  so  led  by  divine  work,  but  are 


Ruskin  351 

content  to  rest  in  the  contemplation  of  the  thing 
created.  I  wish  the  reader  to  note  this  especially: 
we  take  pleasure,  or  should  take  pleasure,  in  archi- 
tectural construction  altogether  as  the  manifestation 
of  an  admirable  human  intelligence ;  it  is  not  the 
strength,  not  the  size,  not  the  finish  of  the  work 
which  we  are  to  venerate :  rocks  are  always  stronger, 
mountains  always  larger,  all  natural  objects  more 
finished ;  but  it  is  the  intelligence  and  resolution  of 
man  in  overcoming  physical  difficulty  which  are  to 
be  the  source  of  our  pleasure  and  subject  of  our 
praise.  And  again,  in  decoration  or  beauty,  it  is 
less  the  actual  loveliness  of  the  thing  produced, 
than  the  choice  and  invention  concerned  in  the  pro- 
duction, which  are  to  delight  us ;  the  love  and  the 
thoughts  of  the  workman  more  than  his  work:  his 
work  must  always  be  imperfect,  but  his  thoughts 
and  affections  may  be  true  and  deep. 

This  origin  of  our  pleasure  in  architecture  I  must 
insist  upon  at  somewhat  greater  length,  for  I  would 
fain  do  away  with  some  of  the  ungrateful  coldness 
which  we  show  towards  the  good  builders  of  old 
time.  In  no  art  is  there  closer  connection  between 
our  delight  in  the  work,  and  our  admiration  of  the 
workman's  mind,  than  in  architecture,  and  yet  we 
rarely  ask  for  a  builder's  narrie.  The  patron  at 
whose  cost,  the  monk  through  whose  dreaming,  the 
foundation  was  laid,  we  remember  occasionally; 
never  the  man  who  verily  did  the  work.  Did  the 
reader  ever  hear  of  William  of  Sens  as  having  had 
anything  to  do  with  Canterbury  Cathedral?  or  of 
Pietro  Basegio  as  in  anywise  connected  with  the 
Ducal  Palace  of  Venice  ?  There  is  much  ingratitude 
and  injustice  in  this;  and  therefore  I  desire  my 


352  Best  English  Essays 

reader  to  observe  carefully  how  much  of  his  pleasure 
in  building  is  derived,  or  should  be  derived,  from 
admiration  of  the  intellect  of  men  whose  names  he 
knows  not. 

The  two  virtues  of  architecture  which  we  can 
justly  weigh,  are,  we  said,  its  strength  or  good 
construction,  and  its  beauty  or  good  decoration. 
Consider  first,  therefore,  what  you  mean  when  you 
say  a  building  is  well  constructed  or  well  built; 
you  do  not  merely  mean  that  it  answers  its  purpose, 
—  this  is  much,  and  many  modern  buildings  fail  of 
this  much ;  but  if  it  be  verily  well  built,  it  must 
answer  this  purpose  in  the  simplest  way,  and  with 
no  over-expenditure  of  means.  We  require  of  a 
light-house,  for  instance,  that  it  shall  stand  firm  and 
carry  a  light ;  if  it  do  not  this,  assuredly  it  has 
been  ill  built ;  but  it  may  do  it  to  the  end  of  time, 
and  yet  not  be  well  built.  It  may  have  hundreds 
of  tons  of  stone  in  it  more  than  were  needed,  and 
have  cost  thousands  of  pounds  more  than  it  ought. 
To  pronounce  it  well  or  ill  built,  we  must  know  the 
utmost  forces  it  can  have  to  resist,  and  the  best 
arrangements  of  stone  for  encountering  them,  and 
the  quickest  ways  of  effecting  such  arrangements : 
then  only,  so  far  as  such  arrangements  have  been 
chosen,  and  such  methods  used,  is  it  well  built. 
Then  the  knowledge  of  all  difficulties  to  be  met, 
and  of  all  means  of  meeting  them,  and  the  quick 
and  true  fancy  or  invention  of  the  modes  of  apply- 
ing the  means  to  the  end,  are  what  we  have  to 
admire  in  the  builder,  even  as  he  is  seen  through 
this  first  or  inferior  part  of  his  work.  Mental 
power,  observe :  not  muscular  nor  mechanical,  nor 
technical,  nor  empirical,  —  pure,  precious,  majestic, 


Ruskin  353 

massy  intellect;  not  to  be  had  at  vulgar  price, 
nor  received  without  thanks,  and  without  asking 
from  whom. 

Suppose,  for  instance,  we  are  present  at  the  build- 
ing of  a  bridge:  the  bricklayers  or  masons  have 
had  their  centring  erected  for  them,  and  that  cen- 
tring was  put  together  by  a  carpenter,  who  had  the 
line  of  its  curve  traced  for  him  by  the  architect: 
the  masons  are  dexterously  handling  and  fitting 
their  bricks,  or,  by  the  help  of  machinery,  care- 
fully adjusting  stones  which  are  numbered  for  their 
places.  There  is  probably  in  their  quickness  of  eye 
and  readiness  of  hand  something  admirable;  but 
this  is  not  what  I  ask  the  reader  to  admire:  not 
the  carpentering,  nor  the  bricklaying,  nor  anything 
that  he  can  presently  see  and  understand,  but  the 
choice  of  the  curve,  and  the  shaping  of  the  num- 
bered stones,  and  the  appointment  of  that  number; 
there  were  many  things  to  be  known  and  thought 
upon  before  these  were  decided.  The  man  who 
chose  the  curve  and  numbered  the  stones,  had  to 
know  the  times  and  tides  of  the  river,  and  the 
strength  of  its  floods,  and  the  height  and  flow  of 
them,  and  the  soil  of  the  banks,  and  the  endurance 
of  it,  and  the  weight  of  the  stones  he  had  to  build 
with,  and  the  kind  of  traffic  that  day  by  day  would  be 
carried  on  over  his  bridge,  —  all  this  specially,  and 
all  the  great  general  laws  of  force  and  weight, 
and  their  working;  and  in  the  choice  of  the  curve 
and  numbering  of  stones  are  expressed  not  only 
his  knowledge  of  these,  but  such  ingenuity  and 
firmness  as  he  had,  in  applying  special  means  to 
overcome  the  special  difficulties  about  his  bridge. 
There  is  no  saying  how  much  wit,  how  much  depth 

23 


354  Best  English  Essays 

of  thought,  how  much  fancy,  presence  of  mind, 
courage,  and  fixed  resolution  there  may  have  gone 
to  the  placing  of  a  single  stone  of  it.  This  is 
what  we  have  to  admire,  —  this  grand  power  and 
heart  of  man  in  the  thing;  not  his  technical  or 
empirical  way  of  holding  the  trowel  and  laying 
mortar. 

Now  there  is  in  everything  properly  called  art 
this  concernment  of  the  intellect,  even  in  the  prov- 
ince of  the  art  which  seems  merely  practical.  For 
observe :  in  this  bridge-building  I  suppose  no  refer- 
ence to  architectural  principles ;  all  that  I  suppose 
we  want  is  to  get  safely  over  the  river;  the  man 
who  has  taken  us  over  is  still  a  mere  bridge-builder, 
—  a  builder,  not  an  architect:  he  may  be  a  rough, 
artless,  feelingless  man,  incapable  of  doing  any  one 
truly  fine  thing  all  his  days.  I  shall  call  upon  you 
to  despise  him  presently  in  a  sort,  but  not  as  if  he 
were  a  mere  smoother  of  mortar;  perhaps  a  great 
man,  infinite  in  memory,  indefatigable  in  labour, 
exhaustless  in  expedient,  unsurpassable  in  quickness 
of  thought.  Take  good  heed  you  understand  him 
before  you  despise  him. 

But  why  is  he  to  be  in  anywise  despised?  By 
no  means  despise  him,  unless  he  happen  to  be  with- 
out a  soul,  or  at  least  to  show  no  signs  of  it ;  which 
possibly  he  may  not  in  merely  carrying  you  across 
the  river.  He  may  be  merely  what  Mr.  Carlyle 
rightly  calls  a  human  beaver  after  all;  and  there 
may  be  nothing  in  all  that  ingenuity  of  his  greater 
than  a  complication  of  animal  faculties,  an  intricate 
bestiality,  —  nest  or  hive  building  in  its  highest  de- 
velopment. You  need  something  more  than  this, 
or  the  man  is  despicable;  you  need  that  virtue  of 


Ruskin  355 

building  through  which  he  may  show  his  affections 
and  delights ;  you  need  its  beauty  or  decoration. 

Not  that,  in  reality,  one  division  of  the  man  is 
more  human  than  another.  Theologists  fall  into 
this  error  very  fatally  and  continually;  and  a  man 
from  whom  I  have  learned  much,  Lord  Lindsay, 
has  hurt  his  noble  book  by  it,  speaking  as  if  the 
spirit  of  the  man  only  were  immortal,  and  were 
opposed  to  his  intellect,  and  the  latter  to  the  senses ; 
whereas  all  the  divisions  of  humanity  are  noble  or 
brutal,  immortal  or  mortal,  according  to  the  degree 
of  their  sanctification :  and  there  is  no  part  of  the 
man  which  is  not  immortal  and  divine  when  it  is 
once  given  to  God,  and  no  part  of  him  which  is  not 
mortal  by  the  second  death,  and  brutal  before  the 
first,  when  it  is  withdrawn  from  God.  For  to  what 
shall  we  trust  for  our  distinction  from  the  beasts 
that  perish?  To  our  higher  intellect?  —  yet  are 
we  not  bidden  to  be  wise  as  the  serpent,  and  to 
consider  the  ways  of  the  ant  ?  —  or  to  our  affections  ? 
nay;  these  are  more  shared  by  the  lower  animals 
than  our  intelligence.  Hamlet  leaps  into  the  grave 
of  his  beloved,  and  leaves  it,  —  a  dog  had  stayed. 
Humanity  and  immortality  consist  neither  in  reason, 
nor  in  love;  not  in  the  body,  nor  in  the  animation 
of  the  heart  of  it,  nor  in  the  thoughts  and  stirrings 
of  the  brain  of  it,  —  but  in  the  dedication  of  them 
all  to  Him  who  will  raise  them  up  at  the  last  day. 

It  is  not,  therefore,  that  the  signs  of  his  affections, 
which  man  leaves  upon  his  work,  are  indeed  more 
ennobling  than  the  signs  of  his  intelligence;  but 
it  is  the  balance  of  both  whose  expression  we  need, 
and  the  signs  of  the  government  of  them  all  by 
Conscience;  and  Discretion,  the  daughter  of  Con- 


356  Best  English  Essays 

science.  So,  then,  the  intelligent  part  of  man  being 
eminently,  if  not  chiefly,  displayed  in  the  structure 
of  his  work,  his  affectionate  part  is  to  be  shown 
in  its  decoration;  and,  that  decoration  may  be  in- 
deed lovely,  two  things  are  needed :  first,  that  the 
affections  be  vivid,  and  honestly  shown;  secondly, 
that  they  be  fixed  on  the  right  things. 

You  think,  perhaps,  I  have  put  the  requirements 
in  wrong  order.  Logically  I  have;  practically  I 
have  not:  for  it  is  necessary  first  to  teach  men 
to  speak  out,  and  say  what  they  like,  truly;  and, 
in  the  second  place,  to  teach  them  which  of  their 
likings  are  ill  set,  and  which  justly.  If  a  man 
is  cold  in  his  likings  and  dislikings,  or  if  he  will 
not  tell  you  what  he  likes,  you  can  make  nothing 
of  him.  Only  get  him  to  feel  quickly  and  to  speak 
plainly,  and  you  may  set  him  right.  And  the  fact 
is,  that  the  great  evil  of  all  recent  architectural 
effort  has  not  been  that  men  liked  wrong  things : 
but  that  they  either  cared  nothing  about  any,  or 
pretended  to  like  what  they  did  not.  Do  you  sup- 
pose that  any  modern  architect  likes  what  he  builds, 
or  enjoys  it?  Not  in  the  least.  He  builds  it  be- 
cause he  has  been  told  that  such  and  such  things 
are  fine,  and  that  he  should  like  them.  He  pretends 
to  like  them,  and  gives  them  a  false  relish  of  vanity. 
Do  you  seriously  imagine,  reader,  that  any  living 
soul  in  London  likes  triglyphs  ?  *  —  or  gets  any 
hearty  enjoyment  out  of  pediments?2  You  are 

1  Triglyph.     Literally,  "Three  Cut."    The  awkward  upright 
ornament  with  two  notches  in  it,  and  a  cut  at  each  side,  to  be 
seen  everywhere  at  the  tops  of  Doric  colonnades,  ancient  and 
modern.     (Ruskin's  note.) 

2  Pediment.      The    triangular  space  above   Greek   porticos. 
(Kuskin's  note.) 


Ruskin  357 

much  mistaken.  Greeks  did :  English  people  never 
did,  —  never  will.  Do  you  fancy  that  the  archi- 
tect of  old  Burlington  Mews,  in  Regent  Street,  had 
any  particular  satisfaction  in  putting  the  blank  tri- 
angle over  the  archway,  instead  of  a  useful  garret 
window?  By  no  manner  of  means.  He  had  been 
told  it  was  right  to  do  so,  and  thought  he  should 
be  admired  for  doing  it.  Very  few  faults  of  archi- 
tecture are  mistakes  of  honest  choice:  they  are 
almost  always  hypocrisies. 

So,  then,  the  first  thing  we  have  to  ask  of  the 
decoration  is  that  it  should  indicate  strong  liking, 
and  that  honestly.  It  matters  not  so  much  what  the 
thing  is,  as  that  the  builder  should  really  love  it 
and  enjoy  it,  and  say  so  plainly.  The  architect  of 
Bourges  Cathedral  liked  hawthorns;  so  he  has 
covered  his  porch  with  hawthorn,  —  it  is  a  perfect 
Niobe  of  May.  Never  was  such  hawthorn;  you 
would  try  to  gather  it  forthwith,  but  for  fear  of 
being  pricked.  The  old  Lombard  architects  liked 
hunting;  so  they  covered  their  work  with  horses 
and  hounds,  and  men  blowing  trumpets  two  yards 
long.  The  base  Renaissance  architects  of  Venice 
liked  masquing  and  fiddling ;  so  they  covered  their 
work  with  comic  masks  and  musical  instruments. 
Even  that  was  better  than  our  English  way  of 
liking  nothing,  and  professing  to  like  triglyphs.. 

But  the  second  requirement  in  decoration,  is  a 
sign  of  our  liking  the  right  thing.  And  the  right 
thing  to  be  liked  is  God's  work,  which  he  made 
for  our  delight  and  contentment  in  this  world.  And 
all  noble  ornamentation  is  the  expression  of  man's 
delight  in  God's  work. 

So,  then,  these  are  the  two  virtues  of  building: 


358  Best  English  Essays 

first,  the  signs  of  man's  own  good  work;  secondly, 
the  expression  of  man's  delight  in  better  work  than 
his  own.  And  these  are  the  two  virtues  of  which 
I  desire  my  reader  to  be  able  quickly  to  judge,  at 
least  in  some  measure;  to  have  a  definite  opinion 
up  to  a  certain  point.  Beyond  a  certain  point  he 
cannot  form  one.  When  the  science  of  the  building 
is  great,  great  science  is  of  course  required  to  com- 
prehend it :  and,  therefore,  of  difficult  bridges,  and 
light-houses,  and  harbour  walls,  and  river  dykes, 
and  railway  tunnels,  no  judgment  may  be  rapidly 
formed.  But  of  common  buildings,  built  in  common 
circumstances,  it  is  very  possible  for  every  man, 
or  woman,  or  child,  to  form  judgment  both  rational 
and  rapid.  Their  necessary,  or  even  possible,  fea- 
tures are  but  few ;  the  laws  of  their  construction  are 
as  simple  as  they  are  interesting.  The  labour  of 
a  few  hours  is  enough  to  render  the  reader  master 
of  their  main  points;  and  from  that  moment  he 
will  find  in  himself  a  power  of  judgment  which  can 
neither  be  escaped  nor  deceived,  and  discover  sub- 
jects of  interest  where  everything  before  had  ap- 
peared barren.  For  though  the  laws  are  few  and 
simple,  the  modes  of  obedience  to  them  are  not  so. 
Every  building  presents  its  own  requirements  and 
difficulties;  and  every  good  building  has  peculiar 
appliances  or  contrivances  to  meet  them.  Under- 
stand the  laws  of  structure,  and  you  will  feel  the 
special  difficulty  in  every  new  building  which  you 
approach;  and  you  will  know  also,  or  feel  instinc- 
tively, whether  it  has  been  wisely  met  or  other- 
wise. And  an  enormous  number  of  buildings,  and 
of  styles  of  buildings,  you  will  be  able  to  cast 
aside  at  once,  as  at  variance  with  these  constant 


Ruskin  359 

laws  of  structure,  and  therefore  unnatural  and 
monstrous. 

Then,  as  regards  decoration,  I  want  you  only  to 
consult  your  own  natural  choice  and  liking.  There 
is  a  right  and  wrong  in  it;  but  you  will  assuredly 
like  the  right  if  you  suffer  your  natural  instinct 
to  lead  you.  Half  the  evil  in  this  world  comes  from 
people  not  knowing  what  they  do  like,  not  deliber- 
ately setting  themselves  to  find  out  what  they  really 
enjoy.  All  people  enjoy  giving  away  money,  for 
instance :  they  don't  know  that,  —  they  rather  think 
they  like  keeping  it ;  and  they  do  keep  it  under  this 
false  impression,  often  to  their  great  discomfort. 
Everybody  likes  to  do  good ;  but  not  one  in  a 
hundred  finds  this  out.  Multitudes  think  they  like 
to  do  evil;  yet  no  man  ever  really  enjoyed  doing 
evil  since  God  made  the  world. 

So  in  this  lesser  matter  of  ornament.  It  needs 
some  little  care  to  try  experiments  upon  yourself: 
it  needs  deliberate  question  and  upright  answer. 
But  there  is  no  difficulty  to  be  overcome,  no  abstruse 
reasoning  to  be  gone  into ;  only  a  little  watchfulness 
needed,  and  thoughtfulness,  and  so  much  honesty 
as  will  enable  you  to  confess  to  yourself  and  to  all 
men,  that  you  enjoy  things,  though  great  authori- 
ties say  you  should  not. 

This  looks  somewhat  like  pride;  but  it  is  true 
humility,  a  trust  that  you  have  been  so  created  as  to 
enjoy  what  is  fitting  for  you,  and  a  willingness  to 
be  pleased,  as  it  was  intended  you  should  be.  It 
is  the  child's  spirit,  which  we  are  then  most  happy 
when  we  most  recover;  only  wiser  than  children 
in  that  we  are  ready  to  think  it  subject  of  thankful- 
ness that  we  can  still  be  pleased  with  a  fair  colour  or 


360  Best  English  Essays 

a  dancing  light.  And,  above  all,  do  not  try  to  make 
all  these  pleasures  reasonable,  nor  to  connect  the 
delight  which  you  take  in  ornament  with  that  which 
you  take  in  construction  or  usefulness.  They  have 
no  connection;  and  every  effort  that  you  make  to 
reason  from  one  to  the  other  will  blunt  your  sense 
of  beauty,  or  confuse  it  with  sensations  altogether 
inferior  to  it.  You  were  made  for  enjoyment,  and 
the  world  was  filled  with  things  which  you  will 
enjoy,  unless  you  are  too  proud  to  be  pleased  by 
them,  or  too  grasping  to  care  for  what  you  cannot 
turn  to  other  account  than  mere  delight.  Remem- 
ber that  the  most  beautiful  things  in  the  world  are 
the  most  useless ;  peacocks  and  lilies  for  instance ; 
at  least  I  suppose  this  quill  I  hold  in  my  hand 
writes  better  than  a  peacock's  would,  and  the  peas- 
ants of  Vevay,  whose  fields  in  spring-time  are  as 
white  with  lilies  as  the  Dent  du  Midi  is  with  its 
snow,  told  me  the  hay  was  none  the  better  for  them.1 


THE   CROWN    OF   WILD   OLIVE 
(Introduction  or  Preface.) 

TWENTY  years  ago,  there  was  no  lovelier  piece 
of  lowland  scenery  in  South  England,  nor 
any  more  pathetic  in  the  world,  by  its  expression  of 
sweet  human  character  and  life,  than  that  immedi- 
ately bordering  on  the  sources  of  the  Wandle,  and 
including  the  lower  moors  of  Addington,  and  the 
villages  of  Beddington  and  Carshalton,  with  all  their 
pools  and  streams.  No  clearer  or  diviner  waters  ever 

1  For  concluding  paragraph  of   original,  see    note  foot  of 
page  332. 


Ruskin  361 

sung  with  constant  lips  of  the  hand  which  "  giveth 
rain  from  heaven  " ;  no  pastures  ever  lightened  in 
spring-time  with  more  passionate  blossoming;  no 
sweeter  homes  ever  hallowed  the  heart  of  the  passer- 
by with  their  pride  of  peaceful  gladness  —  fain- 
hidden — yet  full-confessed.  The  place  remains,  or, 
until  a  few  months  ago,  remained,  nearly  unchanged 
in  its  larger  features;  but,  with  deliberate  mind  I 
say,  that  I  have  never  seen  anything  so  ghastly  in  its 
inner  tragic  meaning  —  not  in  Pisan  Maremma  — 
not  by  Campagna  tomb  —  not  by  the  sand-isles  of 
the  Torcellan  shore  —  as  the  slow  stealing  of  aspects 
of  reckless,  indolent,  animal  neglect,  over  the  deli- 
cate sweetness  of  that  English  scene:  nor  is  any 
blasphemy  or  impiety  —  any  frantic  saying  or  god- 
less thought  more  appalling  to  me,  using  the  best 
power  of  judgment  I  have  to  discern  its  sense  and 
scope,  than  the  insolent  defilings  of  those  springs  by 
the  human  herds  that  drink  of  them.  Just  where 
the  welling  of  stainless  water,  trembling  and  pure, 
like  a  body  of  light,  enters  the  pool  of  Carshalton, 
cutting  itself  a  radiant  channel  down  to  the  gravel, 
through  warp  of  feathery  weeds,  all  waving,  which 
it  traverses  with  its  deep  threads  of  clearness,  like 
the  chalcedony  in  moss-agate,  starred  here  and  there 
with  white  grenouillette ;  just  in  the  very  rush  and 
murmur  of  the  first  spreading  currents,  the  human 
wretches  of  the  place  cast  their  street  and  house 
foulness;  heaps  of  dust  and  slime,  and  broken 
shreds  of  old  metal,  and  rags  of  putrid  clothes; 
they  having  neither  energy  to  cart  it  away,  nor 
decency  enough  to  dig  it  into  the  ground,  thus 
shed  into  the  stream,  to  diffuse  what  venom  of  it 
will  float  and  melt,  far  away,  in  all  places  where 


362  Best  English  Essays 

X* 

God  meant  those  waters  to  bring  joy  and  health. 
And,  in  a  little  pool,  behind  some  houses  further 
in  the  village,  where  another  spring  rises,  the  shat- 
tered stones  of  the  well,  and  of  the  little  fretted 
channel  which  was  long  ago  built  and  traced  for 
it  by  gentler  hands,  lie  scattered,  each  from  each, 
under  a  ragged  bank  of  mortar,  and  scoria;  and 
bricklayers'  refuse,  on  one  side,  which  the  clean 
water  nevertheless  chastises  to  purity;  but  it  can- 
not conquer  the  dead  earth  beyond;  and  there, 
circled  and  coiled  under  festering  scum,  the  stagnant 
edge  of  the  pool  effaces  itself  into  a  slope  of  black 
slime,  the  accumulation  of  indolent  years.  Half  a 
dozen  men,  with  one  day's  work,  could  cleanse  those 
pools,  and  trim  the  flowers  about  their  banks,  and 
make  every  breath  of  summer  air  above  them  rich 
with  cool  balm ;  and  every  glittering  wave  me- 
dicinal, as  if  it  ran,  troubled  of  angels,  from  the 
porch  of  Bethesda.  But  that  day's  work  is  never 
given,  nor  will  be;  nor  will  any  joy  be  possible  to 
heart  of  man,  for  evermore,  about  those  wells  of 
English  waters. 

When  I  last  left  them,  I  walked  up  slowly  through 
the  back  streets  of  Croydon,  from  the  old  church  to 
the  hospital;  and,  just  on  the  left,  before  coming 
up  to  the  crossing  of  the  High  Street,  there  was 
a  new  public-house  built.  And  the  front  of  it  was 
built  in  so  wise  manner,  that  a  recess  of  two  feet 
was  left  below  its  front  windows,  between  them  and 
the  street-pavement  —  a  recess  too  narrow  for  any 
possible  use  (for  even  if  it  had  been  occupied  by  a 
seat,  as  in  old  time  it  might  have  been,  everybody 
walking  along  the  street  would  have  fallen  over  the 
legs  of  the  reposing  wayfarers).  But,  by  way  of 


Ruskin  363 

making  this  two  feet  depth  of  freehold  land  more 
expressive  of  the  dignity  of  an  establishment  for  the 
sale  of  spirituous  liquors,  it  was  fenced  from  the 
pavement  by  an  imposing  iron  railing,  having  four 
or  five  spear-heads  to  the  yard  of  it,  and  six  feet 
high;  containing  as  much  iron  and  iron-work,  in- 
deed, as  could  well  be  put  into  the  space;  and  by 
this  stately  arrangement,  the  little  piece  of  dead 
ground  within,  between  wall  and  street,  became 
a  protective  receptacle  of  refuse;  cigar-ends,  and 
oyster-shells,  and  the  like,  such  as  an  open-handed 
English  street-populace  habitually  scatters  from  its 
presence,  and  was  thus  left,  unsweepable  by  any 
ordinary  methods.  Now  the  iron  bars  which,  use- 
lessly (or  in  great  degree  worse  than  uselessly), 
inclosed  this  bit  of  ground,  and  made  it  pestilent, 
represented  a  quantity  of  work  which  would  have 
cleansed  the  Carshalton  pools  three  times  over  — 
of  work,  partly  cramped  and  deadly,  in  the  mine; 
partly  fierce  *  and  exhaustive,  at  the  furnace ;  partly 

1  "A  fearful  occurrence  took  place  a  few  days  since,  near 
Wolverhampton.  Thomas  Snape,  aged  nineteen,  was  on  duty  as 
the  '  keeper '  of  a  blast-furnace  at  Deepfield,  assisted  by  John 
Gardner,  aged  eighteen,  and  Joseph  Swift,  aged  thirty  seven. 
The  furnace  contained  four  tons  of  molten  iron,  and  an  equal 
amount  of  cinders,  and  ought  to  have  been  run  out  at  7.30  P.M. 
But  Snape  and  his  mates,  engaged  in  talking  and  drinking,  neg- 
lected their  duty,  and,  in  the  meantime,  the  iron  rose  in  the 
furnace  until  it  reached  a  pipe  wherein  water  was  contained. 
Just  as  the  men  had  stripped,  and  were  proceeding  to  tap  the 
furnace,  the  water  in  the  pipe,  converted  into  steam,  burst  down 
its  front  and  let  loose  on  them  the  molten  metal,  which  instan- 
taneously consumed  Gardner.  Snape,  terribly  burnt,  and  mad 
with  pain,  leaped  into  the  canal  and  then  ran  home  and  fell  dead 
on  the  threshold.  Swift  survived  to  reach  the  hospital,  where  he 
died  too."  (Ruskin's  note.) 


364  Best  English  Essays 

foolish  and  sedentary,  of  ill-taught  students  making 
bad  designs:  work  from  the  beginning  to  the  last 
fruits  of  it,  and  in  all  the  branches  of  it,  venomous, 
deathful,  and  miserable.  Now,  how  did  it  come  to 
pass  that  this  work  was  done  instead  of  the  other; 
that  the  strength  and  life  of  the  English  operative 
were  spent  in  defiling  ground,  instead  of  redeeming 
it;  and  in  producing  an  entirely  (in  that  place) 
valueless  piece  of  metal,  which  can  neither  be  eaten 
nor  breathed,  instead  of  medicinal  fresh  air,  and 
pure  water? 

There  is  but  one  reason  for  it,  and  at  present  a 
conclusive  one  —  that  the  capitalist  can  charge  per- 
centage on  the  work  in  the  one  case,  and  cannot  in 
the  other.  If,  having  certain  funds  for  supporting 
labour  at  my  disposal,  I  pay  men  merely  to  keep  my 
ground  in  order,  my  money  is,  in  that  function, 
spent  once  for  all ;  but  if  I  pay  them  to  dig  iron 
out  of  my  ground,  and  work  it,  and  sell  it,  I  can 
charge  rent  for  the  ground,  and  percentage  both  on 
the  manufacture  and  the  sale,  and  make  my  capital 
profitable  in  these  three  by-ways.  The  greater  part 
of  the  profitable  investment  of  capital,  in  the  present 
day,  is  in  operations  of  this  kind,  in  which  the  pub- 
lic is  persuaded  to  buy  something  of  no  use  to  it, 
on  production,  or  sale,  of  which,  the  capitalist  may 
charge  percentage;  the  said  public  remaining  all 
the  while  under  the  persuasion  that  the  percentages 
thus  obtained  are  real  national  gains,  whereas,  they 
are  merely  filchings  out  of  partially  light  pockets, 
to  swell  heavy  ones. 

Thus,  the  Croydon  publican  buys  the  iron  railing, 
to  make  himself  more  conspicuous  to  drunkards. 
The  public-house-keeper  on  the  other  side  of  the 


Ruskin  365 

way  presently  buys  another  railing,  to  out-rail  him 
with.  Both  are,  as  to  their  relative  attractiveness  to 
customers  of  taste,  just  where  they  were  before; 
but  they  have  lost  the  price  of  the  railings;  which 
they  must  either  themselves  finally  lose,  or  make 
their  aforesaid  customers  of  taste  pay,  by  raising 
the  price  of  their  beer,  or  adulterating  it.  Either 
the  publicans,  or  their  customers,  are  thus  poorer 
by  precisely  what  the  capitalist  has  gained ;  and  the 
value  of  the  work  itself,  meantime,  has  been  lost  to 
the  nation ;  the  iron  bars  in  that  form  and  place 
being  wholly  useless.  It  is  this  mode  of  taxation 
of  the  poor  by  the  rich  which  is  referred  to  else- 
where, in  comparing  the  modern  acquisitive  power 
of  capital  with  that  of  the  lance  and  sword; 
the  only  difference  being  that  the  levy  of  black- 
mail in  old  times  was  by  force,  and  is  now  by 
cozening.  The  old  rider  and  reiver  frankly  quar- 
tered himself  on  the  publican  for  the  night;  the 
modern  one  merely  makes  his  lance  into  an  iron 
spike,  and  persuades  his  host  to  buy  it.  One  comes 
as  an  open  robber,  the  other  as  a  cheating  peddler; 
but  the  result,  to  the  injured  person's  pocket,  is 
absolutely  the  same.  Of  course  many  useful  indus- 
tries mingle  with,  and  disguise  the  useless  ones ; 
and  in  the  habits  of  energy  aroused  by  the  struggle, 
there  is  a  certain  direct  good.  It  is  far  better  to 
spend  four  thousand  pounds  in  making  a  good  gun, 
and  then  to  blow  it  to  pieces,  than  to  pass  life  in  idle- 
ness. Only  do  not  let  it  be  called  "  political  econ- 
omy." There  is  also  a  confused  notion  in  the  minds 
of  many  persons,  that  the  gathering  of  the  property 
of  the  poor  into  the  hands  of  the  rich  does  no  ulti- 
mate harm;  since,  in  whosesoever  hands  it  may  be, 


366  Best  English  Essays 

it  must  be  spent  at  last,  and  thus,  they  think,  return 
to  the  poor  again.  This  fallacy  has  been  again  and 
again  exposed;  but  grant  the  plea  true,  and  the 
same  apology  may,  of  course,  be  made  for  black- 
mail, or  any  other  form  of  robbery.  It  might  be 
(though  practically  it  never  is)  as  advantageous 
for  the  nation  that  the  robber  should  have  the 
spending  of  the  money  he  extorts,  as  that  the  per- 
son robbed  should  have  spent  it.  But  this  is  no 
excuse  for  the  theft.  If  I  were  to  put  a  turnpike 
on  the  road  where  it  passes  my  own  gate,  and  en- 
deavour to  exact  a  shilling  from  every  passenger, 
the  public  would  soon  do  away  with  my  gate, 
without  listening  to  any  plea  on  my  part  that  "  it 
was  as  advantageous  to  them,  in  the  end,  that  I 
should  spend  their  shillings,  as  that  they  themselves 
should."  But  if,  instead  of  out-facing  them  with  a 
turnpike  I  can  only  persuade  them  to  come  in  and 
buy  stones,  or  old  iron,  or  any  other  useless  thing, 
out  of  my  ground,  I  may  rob  them  to  the  same 
extent  and  be,  moreover,  thanked  as  a  public  bene- 
factor, and  promoter  of  commercial  prosperity.  And 
this  main  question  for  the  poor  of  England  —  for 
the  poor  of  all  countries  —  is  wholly  omitted  in 
every  common  treatise  on  the  subject  of  wealth. 
Even  by  the  labourers  themselves,  the  operation  of 
capital  is  regarded  only  in  its  effect  on  their  imme- 
diate interests ;  never  in  the  far  more  terrific  power 
of  its  appointment  of  the  kind  and  the  object  of 
labour.  It  matters  little,  ultimately,  how  much  a 
labourer  is  paid  for  making  anything;  but  it  mat- 
ters fearfully  what  the  thing  is  which  he  is  com- 
pelled to  make.  If  his  labour  is  so  ordered  as  to 
produce  food,  and  fresh  air,  and  fresh  water,  no 


Ruskin  367 

matter  that  his  wages  are  low  —  the  food  and  fresh 
air  and  water  will  be  at  last  there;  and  he  will 
at  last  get  them.  But  if  he  is  paid  to  destroy 
food  and  fresh  air,  or  to  produce  iron  bars  in- 
stead of  them  —  the  food  and  air  will  finally  not 
be  there,  and  he  will  not  get  them,  to  his  great 
and  final  inconvenience.  So  that,  conclusively,  in 
political  as  in  household  economy,  the  great  ques- 
tion is,  not  so  much  what  money  you  have  in 
your  pocket,  as  what  you  will  buy  with  it,  and  do 
with  it. 

I  have  been  long  accustomed,  as  all  men  engaged 
in  work  of  investigation  must  be,  to  hear  my  state- 
ments laughed  at  for  years,  before  they  are  exam- 
ined or  believed ;  and  I  am  generally  content  to  wait 
the  public's  time.  But  it  has  not  been  without  dis- 
pleased surprise  that  I  have  found  myself  totally 
unable,  as  yet,  by  any  repetition,  or  illustration,  to 
force  this  plain  thought  into  my  readers'  heads  — 
that  the  wealth  of  nations,  as  of  men,  consists  in 
substance,  not  in  ciphers ;  and  that  the  real  good  of 
all  work,  and  of  all  commerce,  depends  on  the  final 
worth  of  the  thing  you  make,  or  get  by  it.  This  is 
a  practical  enough  statement,  one  would  think :  but 
the  English  public  has  been  so  possessed  by  its 
modern  school  of  economists  with  the  notion  that 
Business  is  always  good,  whether  it  be  busy  in  mis- 
chief or  in  benefit ;  and  that  buying  and  selling  are 
always  salutary,  whatever  the  intrinsic  worth  of 
what  you  buy  or  sell  —  that  it  seems  impossible  to 
gain  so  much  as  a  patient  hearing  for  any  inquiry 
respecting  the  substantial  result  of  our  eager  modern 
labours.  I  have  never  felt  more  checked  by  the 
sense  of  this  impossibility  than  in  arranging  the 


368  Best  English  Essays 

heads  of  the  following  three  lectures,1  which, 
though  delivered  at  considerable  intervals  of  time, 
and  in  different  places,  were  not  prepared  without 
reference  to  each  other.  Their  connection  would, 
however,  have  been  made  far  more  distinct,  if  I 
had  not  been  prevented,  by  what  I  feel  to  be  another 
great  difficulty  in  addressing  English  audiences, 
from  enforcing,  with  any  decision,  the  common,  and 
to  me  the  most  important,  part  of  their  subjects.  I 
chiefly  desired  (as  I  have  just  said)  to  question  my 
hearers  —  operatives,  merchants,  and  soldiers,  as 
to  the  ultimate  meaning  of  the  business  they  had  in 
hand;  and  to  know  from  them  what  they  expected 
or  intended  their  manufacture  to  come  to,  their  sell- 
ing to  come  to,  and  their  killing  to  come  to.  That 
appeared  the  first  point  needing  determination  before 
I  could  speak  to  them  with  any  real  utility  or  effect. 
"You  craftsmen — salesmen — swordsmen  —  do  but 
tell  me  clearly  what  you  want,  then,  if  I  can  say 
anything  to  help  you,  I  will ;  and  if  not,  I  will 
account  to  you  as  I  best  may  for  my  inability."  But 
in  order  to  put  this  question  into  any  terms,  one 
had  first  of  all  to  face  the  difficulty  just  spoken  of 
—  to  me  for  the  present  insuperable  —  the  difficulty 
of  knowing  whether  to  address  one's  audience  as 
believing,  or  not  believing,  in  any  other  world  than 
this.  For  if  you  address  any  average  modern 
English  company  as  believing  in  an  Eternal  life, 
and  endeavour  to  draw  any  conclusions,  from  this 
assumed  belief,  as  to  their  present  business,  they 
will  forthwith  tell  you  that  what  you  say  is  very 
beautiful,  but  it  is  not  practical.  If,  on  the  contrary, 

1  The  titles  are  "  Work,"  "  Traffic,"  "  War,"  not  reprinted  in 
this  volume. 


Ruskin  369 

you  frankly  address  them  as  unbelievers  in  Eternal 
life,  and  try  to  draw  any  consequences  from  that 
unbelief  —  they  immediately  hold  you  for  an  ac- 
cursed person,  and  shake  off  the  dust  from  their  feet 
at  you.  And  the  more  I  thought  over  what  I  had 
got  to  say,  the  less  I  found  I  could  say  it,  without 
some  reference  to  this  intangible  or  intractable  part 
of  the  subject.  It  made  all  the  difference,  in  assert- 
ing any  principle  of  war,  whether  one  assumed  that 
a  discharge  of  artillery  would  merely  knead  down  a 
certain  quantity  of  red  clay  into  a  level  line,  as  in 
a  brick  field;  or  whether,  out  of  every  separately 
Christian-named  portion  of  the  ruinous  heap,  there 
went  out,  into  the  smoke  and  dead-fallen  air  of 
battle,  some  astonished  condition  of  soul,  unwillingly 
released.  It  made  all  the  difference,  in  speaking 
of  the  possible  range  of  commerce,  whether  one 
assumed  that  all  bargains  related  only  to  visible 
property  —  or  whether  property,  for  the  present 
invisible,  but  nevertheless  real,  was  elsewhere  pur- 
chasable on  other  terms.  It  made  all  the  difference 
in  addressing  a  body  of  men  subject  to  considerable 
hardship,  and  having  to  find  some  way  out  of  it  — 
whether  one  could  confidently  say  to  them,  "  My 
friends  —  you  have  only  to  die,  and  all  will  be 
right " ;  or  whether  one  had  any  secret  misgiving 
that  such  advice  was  more  blessed  to  him  that  gave, 
than  to  him  that  took  it.  And  therefore  the  delib- 
erate reader  will  find  throughout  these  lectures,  a 
hesitation  in  driving  points  home,  and  a  pausing 
short  of  conclusions  which  he  will  feel  I  would  fain 
have  come  to ;  hesitation  which  arises  wholly  from 
this  uncertainty  of  my  hearers'  temper.  For  I  do 
not  now  speak,  nor  have  I  ever  spoken,  since  the 
-  24 


370  Best  English  Essays 

time  of  first  forward  youth,  in  any  proselyting  tem- 
per, as  desiring  to  persuade  any  one  of  what,  in  such 
matters,  I  thought  myself;  but,  whomsoever  I 
venture  to  address,  I  take  for  the  time  his  creed  as 
I  find  it,  and  endeavour  to  push  it  into  such  vital 
fruit  as  it  seems  capable  of.  Thus,  it  is  a  creed  with 
a  great  part  of  the  existing  English  people,  that  they 
are  in  possession  of  a  book  which  tells  them,  straight 
from  the  lips  of  God  all  they  ought  to  do,  and  need 
to  know.  I  have  read  that  book,  with  as  much  care 
as  most  of  them,  for  some  forty  years;  and  am 
thankful  that,  on  those  who  trust  it,  I  can  press  its 
pleadings.  My  endeavour  has  been  uniformly  to 
make  them  trust  it  more  deeply  than  they  do ;  trust 
it,  not  in  their  own  favourite  verses  only,  but  in  the 
sum  of  all ;  trust  it  not  as  a  fetich  or  talisman,  which 
they  are  to  be  saved  by  daily  repetitions  of ;  but  as 
a  Captain's  order,  to  be  heard  and  obeyed  at  their 
peril.  I  was  always  encouraged  by  supposing  my 
hearers  to  hold  such  belief.  To  these,  if  to  any, 
I  once  had  hope  of  addressing,  with  acceptance, 
words  which  insisted  on  the  guilt  of  pride,  and  the 
futility  of  avarice;  from  these,  if  from  any,  I  once 
expected  ratification  of  a  political  economy  which 
asserted  that  the  life  was  more  than  the  meat,  and 
the  body  than  raiment ;  and  these,  it  once  seemed 
to  me,  I  might  ask,  without  accusation  of  fanaticism, 
not  merely  in  doctrine  of  the  lips,  but  in  the  be- 
stowal of  their  heart's  treasure,  to  separate  them- 
selves from  the  crowd  of  whom  it  is  written,  "  After 
all  these  things  do  the  Gentiles  seek." 

It  cannot,  however,  be  assumed,  with  any  sem- 
blance of  reason,  that  a  general  audience  is  now 
wholly,  or  even  in  majority,  composed  of  these  reli- 


Ruskin  371 

gious  persons.  A  large  portion  must  always  consist 
of  men  who  admit  no  such  creed ;  or  who,  at  least, 
are  inaccessible  to  appeals  founded  on  it.  And  as, 
with  the  so-called  Christian,  I  desired  to  plead  for 
honest  declaration  and  fulfilment  of  his  belief  in 
life  —  with  the  so-called  Infidel,  I  desired  to  plead 
for  an  honest  declaration  and  fulfilment  of  his  belief 
in  death.  The  dilemma  is  inevitable.  Men  must 
either  hereafter  live,  or  hereafter  die;  fate  may  be 
bravely  met,  and  conduct  wisely  ordered,  on  either 
expectation ;  but  never  in  hesitation  between  un- 
grasped  hope,  and  unconfronted  fear.  We  usually 
believe  in  immortality,  so  far  as  to  avoid  prepara- 
tion for  death ;  and  in  mortality,  so  far  as  to  avoid 
preparation  for  anything  after  death.  Whereas,  a 
wise  man  will  at  least  hold  himself  prepared  for  one 
or  other  of  two  events,  of  which  one  or  other  is 
inevitable ;  and  will  have  all  things  in  order,  for  his 
sleep,  or  in  readiness,  for  his  awakening. 

Nor  have  we  any  right  to  call  it  an  ignoble  judg- 
ment, if  he  determine  to  put  them  in  order,  as  for 
sleep.  A  brave  belief  in  life  is  indeed  an  enviable 
state  of  mind,  but,  as  far  as  I  can  discern,  an  un- 
usual one.  I  know  few  Christians  so  convinced  of 
the  splendour  of  the  rooms  in  their  Father's  house, 
as  to  be  happier  when  their  friends  are  called  to 
those  mansions,  than  they  would  have  been  if  the 
Queen  had  sent  for  them  to  live  at  court:  nor  has 
the  Church's  most  ardent  "  desire  to  depart,  and  be 
with  Christ,"  ever  cured  it  of  the  singular  habit  of 
putting  on  mourning  for  every  person  summoned 
to  such  departure.  On  the  contrary,  a  brave  belief 
in  death  has  been  assuredly  held  by  many  not 
ignoble  persons,  and  it  is  a  sign  of  the  last  depravity 


372  Best  English  Essays 

in  the  Church  itself,  when  it  assumes  that  such  a 
belief  is  inconsistent  with  either  purity  of  character, 
or  energy  of  hand.  The  shortness  of  life  is  not, 
to  any  rational  person,  a  conclusive  reason  for  wast- 
ing the  space  of  it  which  may  be  granted  him ;  nor 
does  the  anticipation  of  death  to-morrow  suggest, 
to  any  one  but  a  drunkard,  the  expediency  of  drunk- 
enness to-day.  To  teach  that  there  is  no  device  in 
the  grave,  may  indeed  make  the  deviceless  person 
more  contented  in  his  dulness ;  but  it  will  make  the 
deviser  only  more  earnest  in  devising ;  nor  is  human 
conduct  likely,  in  every  case,  to  be  purer  under  the 
conviction  that  all  its  evil  may  in  a  moment  be  par- 
doned, and  all  its  wrong-doing  in  a  moment  re- 
deemed; and  that  the  sigh  of  repentance,  which 
purges  the  guilt  of  the  past,  will  waft  the  soul  into 
a  felicity  which  forgets  its  pain  —  than  it  may  be 
under  the  sterner,  and  to  many  not  unwise  minds, 
more  probable,  apprehension,  that  "  what  a  man 
soweth  that  shall  he  also  reap  "  —  or  others  reap  — 
when  he,  the  living  seed  of  pestilence,  walketh  no 
more  in  darkness,  but  lies  down  therein. 

But  to  men  whose  feebleness  of  sight,  or  bitter- 
ness of  soul,  or  the  offence  given  by  the  conduct 
of  those  who  claim  higher  hope,  may  have  rendered 
this  painful  creed  the  only  possible  one,  there  is  an 
appeal  to  be  made,  more  secure  in  its  ground  than 
any  which  can  be  addressed  to  happier  persons. 
I  would  fain,  if  I  might  offencelessly,  have  spoken 
to  them  as  if  none  others  heard;  and  have  said 
thus :  Hear  me,  you  dying  men,  who  will  soon  be 
deaf  for  ever.  For  these  others,  at  your  right  hand 
and  your  left,  who  look  forward  to  a  state  of  infinite 
existence,  in  which  all  their  errors  will  be  overruled, 


Ruskin  373 

and  all  their  faults  forgiven ;  for  these,  who,  stained 
and  blackened  in  the  battle  smoke  of  mortality,  have 
but  to  dip  themselves  for  an  instant  in  the  font  of 
death,  and  to  rise  renewed  of  plumage,  as  a  dove 
that  is  covered  with  silver,  and  her  feathers  like 
gold;  for  these,  indeed,  it  may  be  permissible  to 
waste  their  numbered  moments,  through  faith  in  a 
future  of  innumerable  hours ;  to  these,  in  their 
weakness,  it  may  be  conceded  that  they  should 
tamper  with  sin  which  can  only  bring  forth  fruit  of 
righteousness,  and  profit  by  the  iniquity  which,  one 
day,  will  be  remembered  no  more.  In  them,  it  may 
be  no  sign  of  hardness  of  heart  to  neglect  the  poor, 
over  whom  they  know  their  Master  is  watching; 
and  to  leave  those  to  perish  temporarily  who  cannot 
perish  eternally.  But,  for  you,  there  is  no  such 
hope,  and  therefore  no  such  excuse.  This  fate, 
which  you  ordain  for  the  wretched,  you  believe  to 
be  all  their  inheritance ;  you  may  crush  them,  before 
the  moth,  and  they  will  never  rise  to  rebuke  you  — 
their  breath,  which  fails  for  lack  of  food,  once 
expiring,  will  never  be  recalled  to  whisper  against 
you  a  word  of  accusing  —  they  and  you,  as  you 
think,  shall  lie  down  together  in  the  dust,  and  the 
worms  cover  you  —  and  for  them  there  shall  be  no 
consolation,  and  on  you  no  vengeance  —  only  the 
question  murmured  above  your  grave :  "  Who  shall 
repay  him  what  he  hath  done  ?  "  Is  it  therefore 
easier  for  you  in  your  heart  to  inflict  the  sorrow  for 
which  there  is  no  remedy  ?  Will  you  take,  wantonly, 
this  little  all  of  his  life  from  your  poor  brother,  and 
make  his  brief  hours  long  to  him  with  pain?  Will 
you  be  readier  to  the  injustice  which  can  never  be 
redressed;  and  niggardly  of  mercy  which  you  can 


374  Best  English  Essays 

bestow  but  once,  and  which,  refusing,  you  refuse 
for  ever?  I  think  better  of  you,  even  of  the  most 
selfish,  than  that  you  would  do  this,  well  understood. 
And  for  yourselves,  it  seems  to  me,  the  question 
becomes  not  less  grave,  in  these  curt  limits.  If  your 
life  were  but  a  fever  fit  —  the  madness  of  a  night, 
whose  follies  were  all  to  be  forgotten  in  the  dawn, 
it  might  matter  little  how  you  fretted  away  the 
sickly  hours  —  what  toys  you  snatched  at,  or  let  fall 
—  what  visions  you  followed  wistfully  with  the 
deceived  eyes  of  sleepless  frenzy.  Is  the  earth  only 
an  hospital  ?  Play,  if  you  care  to  play,  on  the  floor 
of  the  hospital  dens.  Knit  its  straw  into  what 
crowns  please  you ;  gather  the  dust  of  it  for  treasure, 
and  die  rich  in  that,  clutching  at  the  black  motes  in 
the  air  with  your  dying  hands  —  and  yet,  it  may 
be  well  with  you.  But  if  this  life  be  no  dream, 
and  the  world  no  hospital;  if  all  the  peace  and 
power  and  joy  you  can  ever  win,  must  be  won  now ; 
and  all  fruit  of  victory  gathered  here,  or  never  — 
will  you  still,  throughout  the  puny  totality  of  your 
life,  weary  yourselves  in  the  fire  of  vanity  ?  If  there 
is  no  rest  which  remaineth  for  you,  is  there  none 
you  might  presently  take?  was  this  grass  of  the 
earth  made  green  for  your  shroud  only,  not  for  your 
bed?  and  can  you  never  lie  down  upon  it,  but  only 
under  it?  The  heathen,  to  whose  creed  you  have 
relurned,  thought  not  so.  They  knew  that  life 
brought  its  contest,  but  they  expected  from  it  also 
the  crown  of  all  contest.  No  proud  one !  no  jewelled 
circlet  flaming  through  Heaven  above  the  height  of 
the  unmerited  throne,  only  some  few  leaves  of  wild 
olive,  cool  to  the  tired  brow,  through  a  few  years 
of  peace.  It  should  have  been  of  gold,  they  thought ; 


Ruskin  375 

but  Jupiter  was  poor;  this  was  the  best  the  god 
could  give  them.  Seeking  a  greater  than  this,  they 
had  known  it  a  mockery.  Not  in  war,  not  in  wealth, 
not  in  tyranny,  was  there  any  happiness  to  be  found 
for  them  —  only  in  kindly  peace,  fruitful  and  free. 
The  wreath  was  to  be  of  wild  olive,  mark  you  — 
the  tree  that  grows  carelessly,  tufting  the  rocks  with 
no  vivid  bloom,  no  verdure  of  branch;  only  with 
soft  snow  of  blossom,  and  scarcely  fulfilled  fruit, 
mixed  with  gray  leaf  and  thorn-set  stem;  no  fas- 
tening of  diadem  for  you  but  with  such  sharp  em- 
broidery !  But  this,  such  as  it  is,  you  may  win  while 
yet  you  live;  type  of  grey  honour  and  sweet  rest. 
Free-heartedness,  and  graciousness,  and  undisturbed 
trust  and  requited  love,  and  the  sight  of  the  peace 
of  others,  and  the  ministry  to  their  pain;  —  these 
and  the  blue  sky  above  you,  and  the  sweet  waters 
and  flowers  of  the  earth  beneath ;  and  mysteries  an<4 
presences,  innumerable,  of  living  things, — these  may 
yet  be  here  your  riches ;  untormenting  and  divine : 
serviceable  for  the  life  that  now  is ;  nor,  it  may  be, 
without  promise  of  that  which  is  to  come. 


X 
MATTHEW    ARNOLD 


MATTHEW   ARNOLD: 
THE   INTELLECTUAL   CRITIC 

WE  have  defined  a  critic  as  a  writer  whose 
chief  interest  is  in  his  subject.     He 
devotes    himself   to   discovering   and 
presenting  the  truth  about  that  subject.     If  he  is 
an  impassioned  critic  like  Ruskin,  his  writing  is 
highly  colored  by  his  own  personality.     Let  the 
element  of  passion  be  subjected  to  reason,  and  we 
have  the  true  intellectual  critic,  whose  motto  is, 
Truth  for  Truth's  sake,  as  well  as,  Truth  for  the 
sake  of  humanity. 

Matthew  Arnold  was  perhaps  the  creator  of 
pure,  intellectual  criticism  in  modern  prose. 
Starting  in  life  as  a  poet  whose  work  as  far  as  he 
went  was  comparable  with  Tennyson's,  at  thirty 
he  became  a  school  inspector,  lecturer,  and  liter- 
ary critic.  As  a  critic  of  the  literary  value  of 
other  men's  work,  both  in  poetry  and  prose,  but 
especially  in  poetry,  he  is  the  first  of  English 
writers,  ranking  with  the  French  critics  of  whom 
Sainte-Beuve  is  the  type.  Like  them,  he  went 
back  to  Greek  models.  Indeed,  he  led  the  revival 
in  English  of  the  style  of  writing  and  the  method 
of  thinking  of  which  Plato  is  the  great  exemplar. 


380  Best  English  Essays 

And  now  let  us  ask,  What  is  the  Greek  critical 
style  ? 

Matthew  Arnold  himself  has  differentiated  the 
Hellenic  and  the  Hebraic  by  saying  that  the 
Hellenic  represents  ideas,  the  Hebraic  moral  emo- 
tions. The  one  devotes  itself  to  making  truth 
prevail,  the  other  to  making  goodness  prevail. 
Moreover,  to  the  Greek  "  Beauty  is  Truth,  Truth 
Beauty,"  as  Keats,  the  typical  modern  Grecian 
in  poetry,  has  told  us.  Likewise,  Truth  and 
Beauty  are  Simplicity.  The  Greek  artists  de- 
pended on  the  natural  lines  of  the  human  body 
for  their  notions  of  the  beautiful  in  art,  leaving 
to  barbarous  nations  intricate  design  and  gor- 
geous coloring. 

Matthew  Arnold's  style  is  severely  simple  and 
direct.  He  defines  his  terms  with  the  utmost 
accuracy  and  care.  He  tries  to  remove  from  his 
mind  all  prejudice  for  or  against.  Before  taking 
sides  against  a  subject,  he  is  careful  to  understand 
all  that  can  be  said  in  behalf  of  it.  In  his  literary 
criticisms  he  comes  as  near  telling  us  the  truth 
about  an  author  as  perhaps  any  writer  ever  can. 
And  then  he  passes  on  and  tries  to  tell  us  the 
truth  about  ourselves,  especially  with  regard  to 
the  element  of  simple  beauty  and  perfection  in 
our  lives.  This  is  the  culture  he  would  have  us 
make  to  prevail. 

Undoubtedly  the  essay  by  which  Matthew 
Arnold  is  best  known  is  that  on  "  Sweetness 
and  Light,"  which  forms  a  chapter  in  his  book 


Matthew  Arnold  381 

"  Culture  and  Anarchy."  It  was  written  at 
the  point  of  his  transition  from  purely  literary 
criticism  to  his  theological  discussions  such  as 
"  St.  Paul  and  Protestantism."  Its  subject  is 
almost  identical  with  that  of  Ruskin  in  the  intro- 
duction to  "  The  Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"  and 
the  student  of  style  will  find  great  interest  in 
comparing  and  contrasting  the  two  methods  of 
treatment. 

Though  passion  in  Matthew  Arnold  is  always 
subjected  to  reason,  still  passion  exists  in  his 
nature  just  as  truly  as  in  Ruskin.  Passion  is 
the  motive  force  that  drives  on  man's  interest, 
and  without  it  no  man  could  devote  his  life  to 
a  great  cause  with  any  success.  Ruskin' s  pas- 
sion, often  prevailing  over  his  reason,  leads  him 
into  many  absurdities  of  statement,  and  even 
into  points  of  view  essentially  false.  Matthew 
Arnold's  passion  never  allowed  him  to  distort 
his  statements,  or  swerve  from  what  he  saw  as 
truth  and  accuracy.  It  did,  however,  drive  him 
into  many  barren  and  unprofitable  subjects,  such, 
for  example,  as  the  later  theological  discussions 
into  which  he  was  led  by  the  same  motives  that 
caused  him  to  write  "  Culture  and  Anarchy." 

A  later  representative  of  the  Greek  spirit  and 
literary  style  is  Walter  Pater.  His  writings  are 
more  polished,  more  severely  simple,  more  purely 
classic  than  Matthew  Arnold's;  but  he  never 
rose  to  the  range  of  subject  and  breadth  of  view 
that  we  find  in  the  older  writer,  and,  after  all  that 


382  Best  English  Essays 

may  be  said  in  behalf  of  style  and  purity,  great 
men  are  to  be  measured  by  the  greatness  of  their 
ideas. 


SWEETNESS   AND   LIGHT 
(Culture  and  Anarchy) 

THE  disparagers  of  culture  make  its  motive 
curiosity;  sometimes,  indeed,  they  make  its 
motive  mere  exclusiveness  and  vanity.  The  culture 
which  is  supposed  to  plume  itself  on  a  smattering 
of  Greek  and  Latin  is  a  culture  which  is  begotten 
by  nothing  so  intellectual  as  curiosity;  it  is  valued 
either  out  of  sheer  vanity  and  ignorance  or  else  as 
an  engine  of  social  and  class  distinction,  separating 
its  holder,  like  a  badge  or  title,  from  other  people 
who  have  not  got  it.  No  serious  man  would  call 
this  culture,  or  attach  any  value  to  it,  as  culture,  at 
all.  To  find  the  real  ground  for  the  very  different 
estimate  which  serious  people  will  set  upon  culture, 
we  must  find  some  motive  for  culture  in  the  terms 
of  which  may  lie  a  real  ambiguity;  and  such  a 
motive  the  word  curiosity  gives  us. 

I  have  before  now  pointed  out  that  we  English 
do  not,  like  the  foreigners,  use  this  word  in  a  good 
sense  as  well  as  in  a  bad  sense.  With  us  the  word 
is  always  used  in  a  somewhat  disapproving  sense. 
A  liberal  and  intelligent  eagerness  about  the  things 
of  the  mind  may  be  meant  by  a  foreigner  when  he 
speaks  of  curiosity,  but  with  us  the  word  always 
conveys  a  certain  notion  of  frivolous  and  unedifying 
activity.  In  the  "  Quarterly  Review,"  some  little 
time  ago,  was  an  estimate  of  the  celebrated  French 


Matthew  Arnold  383 

critic,  M.  Sainte-Beuve,  and  a  very  inadequate  esti- 
mate it  in  my  judgment  was.  And  its  inadequacy 
consisted  chiefly  in  this :  that  in  our  English  way  it 
left  out  of  sight  the  double  sense  really  involved 
in  the  word  curiosity,  thinking  enough  was  said  to 
stamp  M.  Sainte-Beuve  with  blame  if  it  was  said 
that  he  was  impelled  in  his  operations  as  a  critic  by 
curiosity,  and  omitting  either  to  perceive  that  M. 
Sainte-Beuve  himself,  and  many  other  people  with 
him,  would  consider  that  this  was  praiseworthy  and 
not  blameworthy,  or  to  point  out  why  it  ought  really 
to  be  accounted  worthy  of  blame  and  not  of  praise. 
For  as  there  is  a  curiosity  about  intellectual  matters 
which  is  futile,  and  merely  a  disease,  so  there  is 
certainly  a  curiosity  —  a  desire  after  the  things  of 
the  mind  simply  for  their  own  sakes  and  for  the 
pleasure  of  seeing  them  as  they  are  —  which  is,  in 
an  intelligent  being,  natural  and  laudable.  Nay, 
and  the  very  desire  to  see  things  as  they  are  implies 
a  balance  and  regulation  of  mind  which  is  not  often 
attained  without  fruitful  effort,  and  which  is  the 
very  opposite  of  the  blind  and  diseased  impulse  of 
mind  which  is  what  we  mean  to  blame  when  we 
blame  curiosity.  Montesquieu  says :  "  The  first 
motive  which  ought  to  impel  us  to  study  is  the 
desire  to  augment  the  excellence  of  our  nature,  and 
to  render  an  intelligent  being  yet  more  intelligent." 
This  is  the  true  ground  to  assign  for  the  genuine 
scientific  passion,  however  manifested,  and  for  cul- 
ture, viewed  simply  as  a  fruit  of  this  passion ;  and 
it  is  a  worthy  ground,  even  though  we  let  the  term 
curiosity  stand  to  describe  it. 

But  there  is  of  culture  another  view,  in  which  not 
solely  the  scientific  passion,  the  sheer  desire  to  see 


384  Best  English  Essays 

things  as  they  are,  natural  and  proper  in  an  intelli- 
gent being,  appears  as  the  ground  of  it.  There  is 
a  view  in  which  all  the  love  of  our  neighbour,  the 
impulses  towards  action,  help,  and  beneficence,  the 
desire  for  removing  human  error,  clearing  human 
confusion,  and  diminishing  human  misery,  the  noble 
aspiration  to  leave  the  world  better  and  happier  than 
we  found  it,  —  motives  eminently  such  as  are  called 
social,  —  come  in  as  part  of  the  grounds  of  culture, 
and  the  main  and  pre-eminent  part.  Culture  is  then 
properly  described  not  as  having  its  origin  in  curi- 
osity, but  as  having  its  origin  in  the  love  of  perfec- 
tion; it  is  a  study  of  perfection.  It  moves  by  the 
force,  not  merely  or  primarily  of  the  scientific  pas- 
sion for  pure  knowledge,  but  also  of  the  moral  and 
social  passion  for  doing  good.  As,  in  the  first  view 
of  it,  we  took  for  its  worthy  motto  Montesquieu's 
words :  "  To  render  an  intelligent  being  yet  more 
intelligent !  "  so,  in  the  second  view  of  it,  there  is 
no  better  motto  which  it  can  have  than  these  words 
of  Bishop  Wilson :  "  To  make  reason  and  the  will 
of  God  prevail !  " 

Only,  whereas  the  passion  for  doing  good  is  apt 
to  be  overhasty  in  determining  what  reason  and  the 
will  of  God  say,  because  its  turn  is  for  acting  rather 
than  thinking  and  it  wants  to  be  beginning  to  act ; 
and  whereas  it  is  apt  to  take  its  own  conceptions, 
which  proceed  from  its  own  state  of  development 
and  share  in  all  the  imperfections  and  immaturities 
of  this,  for  a  basis  of  action ;  what  distinguishes 
culture  is,  that  it  is  possessed  by  the  scientific 
passion  as  well  as  by  the  passion  of  doing  good; 
that  it  demands  worthy  notions  of  reason  and  the 
will  of  God,  and  does  not  readily  suffer  its  own 


Matthew  Arnold  385 

crude  conceptions  to  substitute  themselves  for  them. 
And  knowing  that  no  action  or  institution  can  be 
salutary  and  stable  which  is  not  based  on  reason 
and  the  will  of  God,  it  is  not  so  bent  on  acting  and 
instituting,  even  with  the  great  aim  of  diminishing 
human  error  and  misery  ever  before  its  thoughts, 
but  that  it  can  remember  that  acting  and  instituting 
are  of  little  use,  unless  we  know  how  and  what  we 
ought  to  act  and  to  institute. 

This  culture  is  more  interesting  and  more  far- 
reaching  than  that  other,  which  is  founded  solely 
on  the  scientific  passion  for  knowing.  But  it  needs 
times  of  faith  and  ardour,  times  when  the  intellec- 
tual horizon  is  opening  and  widening  all  round 
us,  to  flourish  in.  And  is  not  the  close  and  bounded 
intellectual  horizon  within  which  we  have  long  lived 
and  moved  now  lifting  up,  and  are  not  new  lights 
finding  free  passage  to  shine  in  upon  us?  For  a 
long  time  there  was  no  passage  for  them  to  make 
their  way  in  upon  us,  and  then  "it  was  of  no  use 
to  think  of  adapting  the  world's  action  to  them. 
Where  was  the  hope  of  making  reason  and  the  will 
of  God  prevail  among  people  who  had  a  routine 
which  they  had  christened  reason  and  the  will  of 
God,  in  which  they  were  inextricably  bound,  and 
beyond  which  they  had  no  power  of  looking?  But 
now  the  iron  force  of  adhesion  to  the  old  routine, 
—  social,  political,  religious,  —  has  wonderfully 
yielded ;  the  iron  force  of  exclusion  of  all  which  is 
new  has  wonderfully  yielded.  The  danger  now  is, 
not  that  people  should  obstinately  refuse  to  allow 
anything  but  their  old  routine  to  pass  fbr  reason 
and  the  will  of  God,  but  either  that  they  should 
allow  some  novelty  or  other  to  pass  for  these  too 

25 


386  Best  English  Essays 

easily,  or  else  that  they  should  underrate  the  im- 
portance of  them  altogether,  and  think  it  enough  to 
follow  action  for  its  own  sake,  without  troubling 
themselves  to  make  reason  and  the  will  of  God  pre- 
vail therein.  Now,  then,  is  the  moment  for  culture 
to  be  of  service,  culture  which  believes  in  making 
reason  and  the  will  of  God  prevail,  believes  in  per- 
fection, is  the  study  and  pursuit  of  perfection,  and 
is  no  longer  debarred,  by  a  rigid  invincible  exclusion 
of  whatever  is  new,  from  getting  acceptance  for  its 
ideas,  simply  because  they  are  new. 

The  moment  this  view  of  culture  is  seized,  the 
moment  it  is  regarded  not  solely  as  the  endeavour 
to  see  things  as  they  are,  to  draw  towards  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  universal  order  which  seems  to  be  in- 
tended and  aimed  at  in  the  world,  and  which  it  is 
a  man's  happiness  to  go  along  with  or  his  misery 
to  go  counter  to,  —  to  learn,  in  short,  the  will  of 
God,  —  the  moment,  I  say,  culture  is  considered 
not  merely  as  the  endeavour  to  see  and  learn  this, 
but  as  the  endeavour,  also,  to  make  it  prevail,  the 
moral,  social,  and  beneficent  character  of  culture 
becomes  manifest.  The  mere  endeavour  to  see  and 
learn  the  truth  for  our  own  personal  satisfaction 
is  indeed  a  commencement  for  making  it  prevail, 
a  preparing  the  way  for  this,  which  always  serves 
this,  and  is  wrongly,  therefore,  stamped  with  blame 
absolutely  in  itself  and  not  only  in  its  caricature  and 
degeneration.  But  perhaps  it  has  got  stamped  with 
blame,  and  disparaged  with  the  dubious  title  of 
curiosity,  because  in  comparison  with  this  wider 
endeavour  of  such  great  and  plain  utility  it  looks 
selfish,  petty,  and  unprofitable. 

And  religion,  the  greatest  and  most  important  of 


Matthew  Arnold  387 

the  efforts  by  which  the  human  race  has  manifested 
its  impulse  to  perfect  itself,  —  religion,  that  voice  of 
the  deepest  human  experience,  —  does  not  only 
enjoin  and  sanction  the  aim  which  is  the  great  aim 
of  culture,  the  aim  of  setting  ourselves  to  ascertain 
what  perfection  is  and  to  make  it  prevail ;  but  also, 
in  determining  generally  in  what  human  perfection 
consists,  religion  comes  to  a  conclusion  identical 
with  that  which  culture  —  culture  seeking  the  deter- 
mination of  this  question  through  all  the  voices  of 
human  experience  which  have  been  heard  upon  it, 
of  art,  science,  poetry,  philosophy,  history,  as  well 
as  of  religion,  in  order  to  give  a  greater  fulness  and 
certainty  to  its  solution  —  likewise  reaches.  Re- 
ligion says:  The  kingdom  of  God  is  within  you; 
and  culture,  in  like  manner,  places  human  perfection 
in  an  internal  condition,  in  the  growth  and  pre- 
dominance of  our  humanity  proper,  as  distinguished 
from  our  animality.  It  places  it  in  the  ever-increas- 
ing efficacy  and  in  the  general  harmonious  expan- 
sion of  those  gifts  of  thought  and  feeling,  which 
make  the  peculiar  dignity,  wealth,  and  happiness  of 
human  nature.  As  I  have  said  on  a  former  occa- 
sion :  "  It  is  in  making  endless  additions  to  itself, 
in  the  endless  expansion  of  its  powers,  in  endless 
growth  in  wisdom  and  beauty,  that  the  spirit  of  the 
human  race  finds  its  ideal.  To  reach  this  ideal, 
culture  is  an  indispensable  aid,  and  that  is  the  true 
value  of  culture."  Not  a  having  and  a  resting,  but 
a  growing  and  a  becoming,  is  the  character  of  per- 
fection as  culture  conceives  it;  and  here,  too,  it 
coincides  with  religion. 

And  because  men  are  all  members  of  one  great 
whole,  and  the  sympathy  which  is  in  human  nature 


388  Best  English  Essays 

will  not  allow  one  member  to  be  indifferent  to  the 
rest  or  to  have  a  perfect  welfare  independent  of  the 
rest,  the  expansion  of  our  humanity,  to  suit  the  idea 
of  perfection  which  culture  forms,  must  be  a  general 
expansion.  Perfection,  as  culture  conceives  it,  is 
not  possible  while  the  individual  remains  isolated. 
The  individual  is  required,  under  pain  of  being 
stunted  and  enfeebled  in  his  own  development  if 
he  disobeys,  to  carry  others  along  with  him  in  his 
march  towards  perfection,  to  be  continually  doing 
all  he  can  to  enlarge  and  increase  the  volume  of 
the  human  stream  sweeping  thitherward.  And  here, 
once  more,  culture  lays  on  us  the  same  obligation 
as  religion,  which  says,  as  Bishop  Wilson  has  ad- 
mirably put  it,  that  "  to  promote  the  kingdom  of 
God  is  to  increase  and  hasten  one's  own  happiness." 

But,  finally,  perfection  —  as  culture  from  a 
thorough  disinterested  study  of  human  nature  and 
human  experience  learns  to  conceive  it  —  is  a  har- 
monious expansion  of  all  the  powers  which  make 
the  beauty  and  worth  of  human  nature,  and  is  not 
consistent  with  the  over-development  of  any  one 
power  at  the  expense  of  the  rest.  Here  culture  goes 
beyond  religion,  as  religion  is  generally  conceived 
by  us. 

If  culture,  then,  is  a  study  of  perfection,  and  of 
harmonious  perfection,  general  perfection,  and  per- 
fection which  consists  in  becoming  something  rather 
than  in  having  something,  in  an  inward  condition 
of  the  mind  and  spirit,  not  in  an  outward  set  of 
circumstances,  —  it  is  clear  that  culture,  instead  of 
being  the  frivolous  and  useless  thing  which  Mr. 
Bright,  and  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison,  and  many  other 
Liberals  are  apt  to  call  it,  has  a  very  important 


Matthew  Arnold  389 

function  to  fulfil  for  mankind.  And  this  function 
is  particularly  important  in  our  modern  world,  of 
which  the  whole  civilisation  is,  to  a  much  greater 
degree  than  the  civilisation  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
mechanical  and  external,  and  tends  constantly  to 
become  more  so.  But  above  all  in  our  own  country 
has  culture  a  weighty  part  to  perform,  because  here 
that  mechanical  character,  which  civilisation  tends 
to  take  everywhere,  is  shown  in  the  most  eminent 
degree.  Indeed  nearly  all  the  characters  of  perfec- 
tion, as  culture  teaches  us  to  fix  them,  meet  in  this 
country  with  some  powerful  tendency  which  thwarts 
them  and  sets  them  at  defiance.  The  idea  of  per- 
fection as  an  inward  condition  of  the  mind  and 
spirit  is  at  variance  with  the  mechanical  and  mate- 
rial civilisation  in  esteem  with  us,  and  nowhere,  as 
I  have  said,  so  much  in  esteem  as  with  us.  The 
idea  of  perfection  as  a  general  expansion  of  the 
human  family  is  at  variance  with  our  strong  indivi- 
dualism, our  hatred  of  all  limits  to  the  unrestrained 
swing  of  the  individual's  personality,  our  maxim  of 
"  every  man  for  himself."  Above  all,  the  idea  of 
perfection  as  a  harmonious  expansion  of  human 
nature  is  at  variance  with  our  want  of  flexibility, 
with  our  inaptitude  for  seeing  more  than  one  side 
of  a  thing,  with  our  intense  energetic  absorption  in 
the  particular  pursuit  we  happen  to  be  following. 
So  culture  has  a  rough  task  to  achieve  in  this 
country.  Its  preachers  have,  and  are  likely  long  to 
have,  a  hard  time  of  it,  and  they  will  much  oftener 
be  regarded,  for  a  great  while  to  come,  as  elegant 
or  spurious  Jeremiahs  than  as  friends  and  bene- 
factors. That,  however,  will  not  prevent  their 
doing  in  the  end  good  service  if  they  persevere. 


390  Best  English  Essays 

And,  meanwhile,  the  mode  of  action  they  have  to 
pursue,  and  the  sort  of  habits  they  must  fight 
against,  ought  to  be  made  quite  clear  for  every  one 
to  see,  who  may  be  willing  to  look  at  the  matter 
attentively  and  dispassionately. 

Faith  in  machinery  is,  I  said,  our  besetting 
danger;  often  in  machinery  most  absurdly  dispro- 
portioned  to  the  end  which  this  machinery,  if  it  is 
to  do  any  good  at  all,  is  to  serve;  but  always  in 
machinery,  as  if  it  had  a  value  in  and  for  itself. 
What  is  freedom  but  machinery?  what  is  popula- 
tion but  machinery?  what  is  coal  but  machinery? 
what  are  railroads  but  machinery?  what  is  wealth 
but  machinery?  what  are,  even,  religious  organisa- 
tions but  machinery?  Now  almost  every  voice  in 
England  is  accustomed  to  speak  of  these  things  as 
if  they  were  precious  ends  in  themselves,  and  there- 
fore had  some  of  the  characters  of  perfection  indis- 
putably joined  to  them.  I  have  before  now  noticed 
Mr.  Roebuck's  stock  argument  for  proving  the 
greatness  and  happiness  of  England  as  she  is,  and 
for  quite  stopping  the  mouths  of  all  gainsayers. 
Mr.  Roebuck  is  never  weary  of  reiterating  this 
argument  of  his,  so  I  do  not  know  why  I  should  be 
weary  of  noticing  it.  "  May  not  every  man  in 
England  say  what  he  likes  ?  "  —  Mr.  Roebuck  per- 
petually asks ;  and  that,  he  thinks,  is  quite  sufficient, 
and  when  every  man  may  say  what  he  likes,  our 
aspirations  ought  to  be  satisfied.  But  the  aspira- 
tions of  culture,  which  is  the  study  of  perfection, 
are  not  satisfied,  unless  what  men  say,  when  they 
may  say  what  they  like,  is  worth  saying,  —  has 
good  in  it,  and  more  good  than  bad.  In  the  same 
way  the  "  Times,"  replying  to  some  foreign  stric- 


Matthew  Arnold  391 

tures  on  the  dress,  looks,  and  behaviour  of  the 
English  abroad,  urges  that  the  English  ideal  is  that 
every  one  should  be  free  to  do  and  to  look  just  as 
he  likes.  But  culture  indefatigably  tries,  not  to 
make  what  each  raw  person  may  like  the  rule  by 
which  he  fashions  himself ;  but  to  draw  ever  nearer 
to  a  sense  of  what  is  indeed  beautiful,  graceful, 
and  becoming,  and  to  get  the  raw  person  to  like 
that. 

And  in  the  same  way  with  respect  to  railroads 
and  coal.  Every  one  must  have  observed  the 
strange  language  current  during  the  late  discussions 
as  to  the  possible  failures  of  our  supplies  of  coal. 
Our  coal,  thousands  of  people  were  saying,  is  the 
real  basis  of  our  national  greatness ;  if  our  coal 
runs  short,  there  is  an  end  of  the  greatness  of 
England.  But  what  is  greatness? — -culture  makes 
us  ask.  Greatness  is  a  spiritual  condition  worthy 
to  excite  love,  interest,  and  admiration;  and  the 
outward  proof  of  possessing  greatness  is  that  we 
excite  love,  interest,  and  admiration.  If  England 
were  swallowed  up  by  the  sea  to-morrow,  which  of 
the  two,  a  hundred  years  hence,  would  most  excite 
the  love,  interest,  and  admiration  of  mankind,  — 
would  most,  therefore,  show  the  evidences  of  hav- 
ing possessed  greatness,  —  the  England  of  the  last 
twenty  years,  or  the  England  of  Elizabeth,  of  a  time 
of  splendid  spiritual  effort,  but  when  our  coal,  and 
our  industrial  operations  depending  on  coal,  were 
very  little  developed?  Well,  then,  what  an  unsound 
habit  of  mind  it  must  be  which  makes  us  talk  of 
things  like  coal  or  iron  as  constituting  the  greatness 
of  England,  and  how  salutary  a  friend  is  culture, 
bent  on  seeing  things  as  they  are,  and  thus  dissipat- 


Best  English  Essays 

ing  delusions  of  this  kind  and  fixing  standards  of 
perfection  that  are  real ! 

Wealth,  again,  that  end  to  which  our  prodigious 
works  for  material  advantage  are  directed,  —  the 
commonest  of  commonplaces  tells  us  how  men  are 
always  apt  to  regard  wealth  as  a  precious  end  in 
itself;  and  certainly  they  have  never  been  so  apt 
thus  to  regard  it  as  they  are  in  England  at  the 
present  time.  Never  did  people  believe  anything 
more  firmly  than  nine  Englishmen  out  of  ten  at  the 
present  day  believe  that  our  greatness  and  welfare 
are  proved  by  our  being  so  very  rich.  Now,  the 
use  of  culture  is  that  it  helps  us,  by  means  of  its 
spiritual  standard  of  perfection,  to  regard  wealth 
as  but  machinery,  and  not  only  to  say  as  a  matter 
of  words  that  we  regard  wealth  as  but  machinery, 
but  really  to  perceive  and  feel  that  it  is  so.  If  it 
were  not  for  this  purging  effect  wrought  upon  our 
minds  by  culture,  the  whole  world,  the  future  as 
well  as  the  present,  would  inevitably  belong  to  the 
Philistines.  The  people  who  believe  most  that  our 
greatness  and  welfare  are  proved  by  our  being  very 
rich,  and  who  most  give  their  lives  and  thoughts  to 
becoming  rich,  are  just  the  very  people  whom  we 
call  Philistines.  Culture  says :  "  Consider  these 
people,  then,  their  way  of  life,  their  habits,  their 
manners,  the  very  tones  of  their  voice ;  look  at  them 
attentively;  observe  the  literature  they  read,  the 
things  which  give  them  pleasure,  the  words  which 
come  forth  out  of  their  mouths,  the  thoughts  which 
make  the  furniture  of  their  minds;  would  any 
amount  of  wealth  be  worth  having  with  the  condi- 
tion that  one  was  to  become  just  like  these  people 
by  having  it  ? "  And  thus  culture  begets  a  dissat- 


Matthew  Arnold  393 

v 

isfaction  which  is  of  the  highest  possible  value  in 
stemming  the  common  tide  of  men's  thoughts  in  a 
wealthy  and  industrial  community,  and  which  saves 
the  future,  as  one  may  hope,  from  being  vulgarised, 
even  if  it  cannot  save  the  present. 

Population,  again,  and  bodily  health  and  vigour, 
are  things  which  are  nowhere  treated  in  such  an  un- 
intelligent, misleading,  exaggerated  way  as  in  Eng- 
land. Both  are  really  machinery;  yet  how  many 
people  all  around  us  do  we  see  rest  in  them  and  fail 
to  look  beyond  them !  Why,  one  has  heard  people, 
fresh  from  reading  certain  articles  of  the  "  Times  " 
on  the  Registrar-General's  returns  of  marriages  and 
births  in  this  country,  who  would  talk  of  our  large 
English  families  in  quite  a  solemn  strain,  as  if  they 
had  something  in  itself  beautiful,  elevating,  and 
meritorious  in  them;  as  if  the  British  Philistine 
would  have  only  to  present  himself  before  the  Great 
Judge  with  his  twelve  children,  in  order  to  be 
received  among  the  sheep  as  a  matter  of  right ! 

But  bodily  health  and  vigour,  it  may  be  said,  are 
not  to  be  classed  with  wealth  and  population  as  mere 
machinery ;  they  have  a  more  real  and  essential 
value.  True ;  but  only  as  they  are  more  intimately 
connected  with  a  perfect  spiritual  condition  than 
wealth  or  population  are.  The  moment  we  disjoin 
them  from  the  idea  of  a  perfect  spiritual  condition, 
and  pursue  them,  as  we  do  pursue  them,  for  their 
own  sake  and  as  ends  in  themselves,  our  worship  of 
them  becomes  as  mere  worship  of  machinery,  as  our 
worship  of  wealth  or  population,  and  as  unintelli- 
gent and  vulgarising  a  worship  as  that  is.  Every 
one  with  anything  like  an  adequate  idea  of  human 
perfection  has  distinctly  marked  this  subordination 


394  Best  English  Essays 

to  higher  and  spiritual  ends  of  the  cultivation  of 
bodily  vigour  and  activity.  "  Bodily  exercise  profit- 
eth  little ;  but  godliness  is  profitable  unto  all  things," 
says  the  author  of  the  Epistle  to  Timothy.  And  the 
utilitarian  Franklin  says  just  as  explicitly:  —  "Eat 
and  drink  such  an  exact  quantity  as  suits  the  consti- 
tution of  thy  body,  in  reference  to  the  services  of 
the  mind."  But  the  point  of  view  of  culture,  keep- 
ing the  mark  of  human  perfection  simply  and 
broadly  in  view,  and  not  assigning  to  this  perfec- 
tion, as  religion  or  utilitarianism  assigns  to  it,  a 
special  and  limited  character,  this  point  of  view,  I 
say,  of  culture  is  best  given  by  these  words  of 
Epictetus:  —  "It  is  a  sign  of  d</>via,"  says  he, — 
that  is,  of  a  nature  not  finely  tempered,  —  "  to  give 
yourselves  up  to  things  which  relate  to  the  body ; 
to  make,  for  instance,  a  great  fuss  about  exercise, 
a  great  fuss  about  eating,  a  great  fuss  about  drink- 
ing, a  great  fuss  about  walking,  a  great  fuss  about 
riding.  All  these  things  ought  to  be  done  merely 
by  the  way :  the  formation  of  the  spirit  and  charac- 
ter must  be  our  real  concern."  This  is  admirable; 
and,  indeed,  the  Greek  word  e£<£uia,  a  finely  tem- 
pered nature,  gives  exactly  the  notion  of  perfection 
as  culture  brings  us  to  conceive  it :  a  harmonious 
perfection,  a  perfection  in  which  the  characters  of 
beauty  and  intelligence  are  both  present,  which 
unites  "  the  two  noblest  of  things,"  —  as  Swift,  who 
of  one  of  the  two,  at  any  rate,  had  himself  all  too 
little,  most  happily  calls  them  in  his  "  Battle  of  the 
Books,"  — "  the  two  noblest  of  things,  sweetness 
and  light."  The  eu^u^?  is  the  man  who  tends 
towards  sweetness  and  light ;  the  d^v^s,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  our  Philistine.  The  immense  spir- 


Matthew  Arnold  395 

itual  significance  of  the  Greeks  is  due  to  their  having 
been  inspired  with  this  central  and  happy  idea  of 
the  essential  character  of  human  perfection ;  and 
Mr.  Bright's  misconception  of  culture,  as  a  smatter- 
ing of  Greek  and  Latin,  comes  itself,  after  all,  from 
this  wonderful  significance  of  the  Greeks  having 
affected  the  very  machinery  of  our  education,  and 
is  in  itself  a  kind  of  homage  to  it. 

In  thus  making  sweetness  and  light  to  be  charac- 
ters of  perfection,  culture  is  of  like  spirit  with 
poetry,  follows  one  law  with  poetry.  Far  more  than 
on  our  freedom,  our  population,  and  our  indus- 
trialism, many  amongst  us  rely  upon  our  religious 
organisations  to  save  us.  I  have  called  religion  a 
yet  more  important  manifestation  of  human  nature 
than  poetry,  because  it  has  worked  on  a  broader 
scale  for  perfection,  and  with  greater  masses  of 
men.  But  the  idea  of  beauty  and  of  a  human  nature 
perfect  on  all  its  sides,  which  is  the  dominant  idea  of 
poetry,  is  a  true  and  invaluable  idea,  though  it  has 
not  yet  had  the  success  that  the  idea  of  conquering 
the  obvious  faults  of  our  animality,  and  of  a  human 
nature  perfect  on  the  moral  side,  —  which  is  the 
dominant  idea  of  religion,  —  has  been  enabled  to 
have ;  and  it  is  destined,  adding  to  itself  the  religious 
idea  of  a  devout  energy,  to  transform  and  govern 
the  other. 

The  best  art  and  poetry  of  the  Greeks,  in  which 
religion  and  poetry  are  one,  in  which  the  idea  of 
beauty  and  of  a  human  nature  perfect  on  all  sides 
adds  to  itself  a  religious  and  devout  energy,  and 
works  in  the  strength  of  that,  is  on  this  account  of 
such  surpassing  interest  and  instructiveness  for  us, 
though  it  was,  —  as,  having  regard  to  the  human 


396  Best  English  Essays 

race  in  general,  and,  indeed,  having  regard  to  the 
Greeks  themselves,  we  must  own,  —  a  premature 
attempt,  an  attempt  which  for  success  needed  the 
moral  and  religious  fibre  in  humanity  to  be  more 
braced  and  developed  than  it  had  yet  been.  But 
Greece  did  not  err  in  having  the  idea  of  beauty,  har- 
mony, and  complete  human  perfection,  so  present 
and  paramount.  It  is  impossible  to  have  this  idea 
too  present  and  paramount;  only,  the  moral  fibre 
must  be  braced  too.  And  we,  because  we  have 
braced  the  moral  fibre,  are  not  on  that  account  in 
the  right  way,  if  at  the  same  time  the  idea  of  beauty, 
harmony,  and  complete  human  perfection,  is  want- 
ing or  misapprehended  amongst  us ;  and  evidently 
it  is  wanting  or  misapprehended  at  present.  And 
when  we  rely  as  we  do  on  our  religious  organisa- 
tions, which  in  themselves  do  not  and  cannot  give 
us  this  idea,  and  think  we  have  done  enough  if  we 
make  them  spread  and  prevail,  then,  I  say,  we  fall 
into  our  common  fault  of  overvaluing  machinery. 

Nothing  is  more  common  than  for  people  to  con- 
found the  inward  peace  and  satisfaction  which  fol- 
lows the  subduing  of  the  obvious  faults  of  our 
animality  with  what  I  may  call  absolute  inward 
peace  and  satisfaction,  —  the  peace  and  satisfaction 
which  are  reached  as  we  draw  near  to  complete  spir- 
itual perfection,  and  not  merely  to  moral  perfection, 
or  rather  to  relative  moral  perfection.  No  people  in 
the  world  have  done  more  and  struggled  more  to 
attain  this  relative  moral  perfection  than  our  Eng- 
lish race  has.  For  no  people  in  the  world  has  the 
command  to  resist  the  devil,  to  overcome  the  wicked 
one,  in  the  nearest  and  most  obvious  sense  of  those 
words,  had  such  a  pressing  force  and  reality.  And 


Matthew  Arnold  397 

we  have  had  our  reward,  not  only  in  the  great 
worldly  prosperity  which  our  obedience  to  this  com- 
mand has  brought  us,  but  also,  and  far  more,  in 
great  inward  peace  and  satisfaction.  But  to  me 
few  things  are  more  pathetic  than  to  see  people,  on 
the  strength  of  the  inward  peace  and  satisfaction 
which  their  rudimentary  efforts  towards  perfection 
have  brought  them,  employ,  concerning  their  in~ 
complete  perfection  and  the  religious  organisations 
within  which  they  have  found  it,  language  which 
properly  applies  only  to  complete  perfection,  and  is 
a  far-off  echo  of  the  human  soul's  prophecy  of  it. 
Religion  itself,  I  need  hardly  say,  supplies  them  in 
abundance  with  this  grand  language.  And  very 
freely  do  they  use  it;  yet  it  is  really  the  severest 
possible  criticism  of  such  an  incomplete  perfection 
as  alone  we  have  yet  reached  through  our  religious 
organisations. 

The  impulse  of  the  English  race  towards  moral 
development  and  self-conquest  has  nowhere  so 
powerfully  manifested  itself  as  in  Puritanism.  No- 
where has  Puritanism  found  so  adequate  an  ex- 
pression as  in  the  religious  organisation  of  the 
Independents.  The  modern  Independents  have  a 
newspaper,  the  "  Nonconformist,"  written  with 
great  sincerity  and  ability.  The  motto,  the  stan- 
dard, the  profession  of  faith  which  this  organ  of 
theirs  carries  aloft,  is :  "  The  Dissidence  of  Dissent 
and  the  Protestantism  of  the  Protestant  religion." 
There  is  sweetness  and  light,  and  an  ideal  of  com- 
plete harmonious  human  perfection !  One  need 
not  go  to  culture  and  poetry  to  find  language  to 
judge  it.  Religion,  with  its  instinct  for  perfection, 
supplies  language  to  judge  it,  language,  too,  which 


398  Best  English  Essays 

is  in  our  mouths  every  day.  "  Finally,  be  of  one 
mind,  united  in  feeling-,"  says  St.  Peter.  There  is 
an  ideal  which  judges  the  Puritan  ideal :  "  The 
Dissidence  of  Dissent  and  the  Protestantism  of  the 
Protestant  religion !  "  And  religious  organisations 
like  this  are  what  people  believe  in,  rest  in,  would 
give  their  lives  for!  Such,  I  say,  is  the  wonderful 
virtue  of  even  the  beginnings  of  perfection,  of  hav- 
ing conquered  even  the  plain  faults  of  our  animality, 
that  the  religious  organisation  which  has  helped  us 
to  do  it  can  seem  to  us  something  precious,  salutary, 
and  to  be  propagated,  even  when  it  wears  such  a 
brand  of  imperfection  on  its  forehead  as  this.  And 
men  have  got  such  a  habit  of  giving  to  the  language 
of  religion  a  special  application,  of  making  it  a 
mere  jargon,  that  for  the  condemnation  which  re- 
ligion itself  passes  on  the  shortcomings  of  their 
religious  organisations  they  have  no  ear;  they  are 
sure  to  cheat  themselves  and  to  explain  this  con- 
demnation away.  They  can  only  be  reached  by  the 
criticism  which  culture,  like  poetry,  speaking  a  lan- 
guage not  to  be  sophisticated,  and  resolutely  testing 
these  organisations  by  the  ideal  of  a  human  perfec- 
tion complete  on  all  sides,  applies  to  them. 

But  men  of  culture  and  poetry,  it  will  be  said, 
are  again  and  again  failing,  and  failing  conspicu- 
ously, in  the  necessary  first  stage  to  a  harmonious 
perfection,  in  the  subduing  of  the  great  obvious 
faults  of  our  animality,  which  it  is  the  glory  of 
these  religious  organisations  to  have  helped  us  to 
subdue.  True,  they  do  often  so  fail.  They  have 
often  been  without  the  virtues  as  well  as  the  faults 
of  the  Puritan ;  it  has  been  one  of  their  dangers 
that  they  so  felt  the  Puritan's  faults  that  they  too 


Matthew  Arnold  399 

much  neglected  the  practice  of  his  virtues.  I  will 
not,  however,  exculpate  them  at  the  Puritan's  ex- 
pense. They  have  often  failed  in  morality,  and 
morality  is  indispensable.  And  they  have  been  pun- 
ished for  their  failure,  as  the  Puritan  has  been 
rewarded  for  his  performance.  They  have  been 
punished  wherein  they  erred;  but  their  ideal  of 
beauty,  of  sweetness  and  light,  and  a  human  nature 
complete  on  all  its  sides,  remains  the  true  ideal  of 
perfection  still;  just  as  the  Puritan's  ideal  of  per- 
fection remains  narrow  and  inadequate,  although 
for  what  he  did  well  he  has  been  richly  rewarded. 
Notwithstanding  the  mighty  results  of  the  Pilgrim 
Fathers'  voyage,  they  and  their  standard  of  perfec- 
tion are  rightly  judged  when  we  figure  to  ourselves 
Shakespeare  or  Virgil  —  souls  in  whom  sweetness 
and  light,  and  all  that  in  human  nature  is  most 
humane,  were  eminent  —  accompanying  them  on 
their  voyage,  and  think  what  intolerable  company 
Shakespeare  and  Virgil  would  have  found  them! 
In  the  same  way  let  us  judge  the  religious  organ- 
isations which  we  see  all  around  us.  Do  not  let 
us  deny  the  good  and  the  happiness  which  they 
have  accomplished ;  but  do  not  let  us  fail  to  see 
clearly  that  their  idea  of  human  perfection  is  nar- 
row and  inadequate,  and  that  the  Dissidence  of 
Dissent  and  the  Protestantism  of  the  Protestant 
religion  will  never  bring  humanity  to  its  true  goal. 
As  I  said  with  regard  to  wealth :  Let  us  look  at 
the  life  of  those  who  live  in  and  for  it,  —  so  I  say 
with  regard  to  the  religious  organisations.  Look  at 
the  life  imaged  in  such  a  newspaper  as  the  "  Non- 
conformist," —  a  life  of  jealousy  of  the  Establish- 
ment, disputes,  tea-meetings,  openings  of  chapels, 


400  Best  English  Essays 

sermons;  and  then  think  of  it  as  an  ideal  of  a 
human  life  completing  itself  on  all  sides,  and  as- 
piring with  all  its  organs  after  sweetness,  light,  and 
perfection ! 

Another  newspaper,  representing,  like  the  "  Non- 
conformist," one  of  the  religious  organisations  of 
this  country,  was  a  short  time  ago  giving  an  account 
of  the  crowd  at  Epsom  on  the  Derby  day,  and  of 
all  the  vice  and  hideousness  which  was  to  be  seen 
in  that  crowd ;  and  then  the  writer  turned  suddenly 
round  upon  Professor  Huxley,  and  asked  him  how 
he  proposed  to  cure  all  this  vice  and  hideousness 
without  religion.  I  confess  I  felt  disposed  to  ask 
the  asker  this  question:  And  how  do  you  propose 
to  cure  it  with  such  a  religion  as  yours?  How  is 
the  ideal  of  a  life  so  unlovely,  so  unattractive,  so 
incomplete,  so  narrow,  so  far  removed  from  a  true 
and  satisfying  ideal  of  human  perfection,  as  is  the 
life  of  your  religious  organisation  as  you  yourself 
reflect  it,  to  conquer  and  transform  all  this  vice 
and  hideousness?  Indeed,  the  strongest  plea  for 
the  study  of  perfection  as  pursued  by  culture,  the 
clearest  proof  of  the  actual  inadequacy  of  the  idea 
of  perfection  held  by  the  religious  organisations, 
-T— expressing,  as  I  have  said,  the  most  widespread 
effort  which  the  human  race  has  yet  made  after 
perfection,  —  is  to  be  found  in  the  state  of  our  life 
and  society  with  these  in  possession  of  it,  and  hav- 
ing been  in  possession  of  it  I  know  not  how  many 
hundred  years.  We  are  all  of  us  included  in  some 
religious  organisation  or  other ;  we  all  call  ourselves, 
in  the  sublime  and  aspiring  language  of  religion 
which  I  have  before  noticed,  children  of  God, 
Children  of  God ;  —  it  is  an  immense  pretension ! 


Matthew  Arnold  401 

—  and  how  are  we  to  justify  it?  By  the  works 
which  we  do,  and  the  words  which  we  speak.  And 
the  work  which  we  collective  children  of  God  do, 
our  grand  centre  of  life,  our  city  which  we  have 
builded  for  us  to  dwell  in,  is  London!  London, 
with  its  unutterable  external  hideousness,  and  with 
its  internal  canker  of  publice  egestas,  privatim 
opulcntia,1  —  to  use  the  words  which  Sallust  puts 
into  Cato's  mouth  about  Rome,  —  unequalled  in 
the  world!  The  word,  again,  which  we  children 
of  God  speak,  the  voice  which  most  hits  our  col- 
lective thought,  the  newspaper  with  the  largest 
circulation  in  England,  nay,  with  the  largest  circu- 
lation in  the  whole  world,  is  the  "Daily  Telegraph"  ! 
I  say  that  when  our  religious  organisations — which 
I  admit  to  express  the  most  considerable  effort  after 
perfection  that  our  race  has  yet  made  —  land  us  in 
no  better  result  than  this,  it  is  high  time  to  examine 
carefully  their  idea  of  perfection,  to  see  whether  it 
does  not  leave  out  of  account  sides  and  forces  of 
human  nature  which  we  might  turn  to  great  use; 
whether  it  would  not  be  more  operative  if  it  were 
more  complete.  And  I  say  that  the  English  reliance 
on  our  religious  organisations  and  on  their  ideas  of 
human  perfection  just  as  they  stand,  is  like  our 
reliance  on  freedom,  on  muscular  Christianity,  on 
population,  on  coal,  on  wealth,  —  mere  belief  in  ma- 
chinery, and  unfruitful;  and  that  it  is  wholesomely 
counteracted  by  culture,  bent  on  seeing  things  as 
they  are,  and  on  drawing  the  human  race  onwards 
to  a  more  complete,  a  harmonious  perfection. 

Culture,  however,  shows  its  single-minded  love  of 
perfection,  its  desire  simply  to  make  reason  and  the 

1  Poverty  for  the  commonwealth,  riches  for  the  individual. 
26 


402  Best  English  Essays 

will  of  God  prevail,  its  freedom  from  fanaticism,  by 
its  attitude  towards  all  this  machinery,  even  while 
it  insists  that  it  is  machinery.  Fanatics,  seeing  the 
mischief  men  do  themselves  by  their  blind  belief  in 
some  machinery  or  other,  —  whether  it  is  wealth 
and  industrialism,  or  whether  it  is  the  cultivation 
of  bodily  strength  and  activity,  or  whether  it  is  a 
political  organisation,  —  or  whether  it  is  a  religious 
organisation,  —  oppose  with  might  and  main  the 
tendency  to  this  or  that  political  and  religious  or- 
ganisation, or  to  games  and  athletic  exercises,  or 
to  wealth  and  industrialism,  and  try  violently  to 
stop  it.  But  the  flexibility  which  sweetness  and 
light  give,  and  which  is  one  of  the  rewards  of  cul- 
ture pursued  in  good  faith,  enables  a  man  to  see 
that  a  tendency  may  be  necessary,  and  even,  as  a 
preparation  for  something  in  the  future,  salutary, 
and  yet  that  the  generations  or  individuals  who  obey 
this  tendency  are  sacrificed  to  it,  that  they  fall  short 
of  the  hope  of  perfection  by  following  it ;  and  that  its 
mischiefs  are  to  be  criticised,  lest  it  should  take  too 
firm  a  hold  and  last  after  it  has  served  its  purpose. 
Mr.  Gladstone  well  pointed  out,  in  a  speech  at 
Paris,  —  and  others  have  pointed  out  the  same 
thing,  —  how  necessary  is  the  present  great  move- 
ment towards  wealth  and  industrialism,  in  order 
to  lay  broad  foundations  of  material  well-being  for 
the  society  of  the  future.  The  worst  of  these  justi- 
fications is,  that  they  are  generally  addressed  to  the 
very  people  engaged,  body  and  soul,  in  the  move- 
ment in  question ;  at  all  events,  that  they  are  always 
seized  with  the  greatest  avidity  by  these  people,  and 
taken  by  them  as  quite  justifying  their  life;  and 
that  thus  they  tend  to  harden  them  in  their  sins. 


Matthew  Arnold  403 

Now,  culture  admits  the  necessity  of  the  movement 
towards  fortune-making  and  exaggerated  industrial- 
ism, readily  allows  that  the  future  may  derive  bene- 
fit from  it ;  but  insists,  at  the  same  time,  that  the 
passing  generations  of  industrialists  —  forming,  for 
the  most  part,  the  stout  main  body  of  Philistinism 
—  are  sacrificed  to  it.  In  the  same  way,  the  result 
of  all  the  games  and  sports  which  occupy  the  pass- 
ing generation  of  boys  and  young  men  may  be  the 
establishment  of  a  better  and  sounder  physical  type 
for  the  future  to  work  with.  Culture  does  not  set 
itself  against  the  games  and  sports ;  it  congratulates 
the  future,  and  hopes  it  will  make  a  good  use  of  its 
improved  physical  basis ;  but  it  points  out  that  our 
passing  generation  of  boys  and  young  men  is,  mean- 
time, sacrificed.  Puritanism  was  perhaps  necessary 
to  develop  the  moral  fibre  of  the  English  race,  Non- 
conformity to  break  the  yoke  of  ecclesiastical  domi- 
nation over  men's  minds  and  to  prepare  the  way 
for  freedom  of  thought  in  the  distant  future;  still, 
culture  points  out  that  the  harmonious  perfection  of 
generations  of  Puritans  and  Nonconformists  have 
been,  in  consequence,  sacrificed.  Freedom  of  speech 
may  be  necessary  for  the  society  of  the  future,  but 
the  young  lions  of  the  "  Daily  Telegraph  "  in  the 
meanwhile  are  sacrificed.  A  voice  for  every  man  in 
his  country's  government  may  be  necessary  for  the 
society  of  the  future,  but  meanwhile  Mr.  Beales  and 
Mr.  Bradlaugh  are  sacrificed. 

Oxford,  the  Oxford  of  the  past,  has  many  faults ; 
and  she  has  heavily  paid  for  them  in  defeat,  in  isola- 
tion, in  want  of  hold  upon  the  modern  world.  Yet 
we  in  Oxford,  brought  up  amidst  the  beauty  and 
sweetness  of  that  beautiful  place,  have  not  failed  to 


404  Best  English  Essays 

seize  one  truth,  —  the  truth  that  beauty  and  sweet- 
ness are  essential  characters  of  a  complete  human 
perfection.  When  I  insist  on  this,  I  am  all  in  the 
faith  and  tradition  of  Oxford.  I  say  boldly  that 
this  our  sentiment  for  beauty  and  sweetness,  our 
sentiment  against  hideousness  and  rawness,  has  been 
at  the  bottom  of  our  attachment  to  so  many  beaten 
causes,  of  our  opposition  to  so  many  triumphant 
movements.  And  the  sentiment  is  true,  and  has 
never  been  wholly  defeated,  and  has  shown  its  power 
even  in  its  defeat.  We  have  not  won  our  political 
battles,  we  have  not  carried  our  main  points,  we 
have  not  stopped  our  adversaries'  advance,  we  have 
not  marched  victoriously  with  the  modern  world; 
but  we  have  told  silently  upon  the  mind  of  the  coun- 
try, we  have  prepared  currents  of  feeling  which  sap 
our  adversaries'  position  when  it  seems  gained,  we 
have  kept  up  our  own  communications  with  the 
future.  Look  at  the  course  of  the  great  movement 
which  shook  Oxford  to  its  centre  some  thirty  years 
ago!  It  was  directed,  as  any  one  who  reads  Dr. 
Newman's  "  Apology "  may  see,  against  what  in 
one  word  may  be  called  "  Liberalism."  Liberalism 
prevailed;  it  was  the  appointed  force  to  do  the 
work  of  the  hour;  it  was  necessary,  it  was  inevh> 
able  that  it  should  prevail.  The  Oxford  movement 
was  broken,  it  failed;  our  wrecks  are  scattered  on 
every  shore: — 

Quae  regio  in  terris  nostri  non  plena  laboris  P1 

But  what  was  it,  this  liberalism,  as  Dr.  Newman  saw 
it,  and  as  it  really  broke  the  Oxford  movement  ?  It 

1  Interpreted    by  the    preceding    clause.     Literally,   "  What 
region  in  the  world  is  not  full  of  our  labor  "  ? 


Matthew  Arnold  405 

was  the  great  middle-class  liberalism,  which  had  for 
the  cardinal  points  of  its  belief  the  Reform  Bill  of 
1832,  and  local  self-government,  in  politics;  in  the 
social  sphere,  free-trade,  unrestricted  competition, 
and  the  making  of  large  industrial  fortunes ;  in  the 
religious  sphere,  the  Dissidence  of  Dissent  and  the 
Protestantism  of  the  Protestant  religion.  I  do  not 
say  that  other  and  more  intelligent  forces  than  this 
were  not  opposed  to  the  Oxford  movement:  but 
this  was  the  force  which  really  beat  it;  this  was 
the  force  which  Dr.  Newman  felt  himself  fighting 
with;  this  was  the  force  which  till  only  the  other 
day  seemed  to  be  the  paramount  force  in  this  coun- 
try, and  to  be  in  possession  of  the  future;  this  was 
the  force  whose  achievements  fill  Mr.  Lowe  with 
such  inexpressible  admiration,  and  whose  rule  he 
was  so  horror-struck  to  see  threatened.  And  where 
is  this  great  force  of  Philistinism  now  ?  It  is  thrust 
into  the  second  rank,  it  is  become  a  power  of  yester- 
day, it  has  lost  the  future.  A  new  power  has  sud- 
denly appeared,  a  power  which  it  is  impossible  yet 
to  judge  fully,  but  which  is  certainly  a  wholly  dif- 
ferent force  from  middle-class  liberalism;  different 
in  its  cardinal  points  of  belief,  different  in  its  tend- 
encies in  every  sphere.  It  loves  and  admires  neither 
the  legislation  of  middle-class  Parliaments,  nor  the 
local  self-government  of  middle-class  vestries,  nor 
the  unrestricted  competition  of  middle-class  indus- 
trialists, nor  the  dissidence  of  middle-class  Dissent 
and  the  Protestantism  of  middle-class  Protestant  re- 
ligion. I  am  not  now  praising  this  new  force,  or 
saying  that  its  own  ideals  are  better;  all  I  say  is, 
that  they  are  wholly  different.  And  who  will  esti- 
mate how  much  the  currents  of  feeling  created  by 


406  Best  English  Essays 

Dr.  Newman's  movements,  the  keen  desire  for 
beauty  and  sweetness  which  it  nourished,  the  deep 
aversion  it  manifested  to  the  hardness  and  vul- 
garity of  middle-class  liberalism,  the  strong  light 
it  turned  on  the  hideous  and  grotesque  illusions 
of  middle-class  Protestantism,  —  who  will  estimate 
how  much  all  these  contributed  to  swell  the  tide  of 
secret  dissatisfaction  which  has  mined  the  ground 
under  self-confident  liberalism  of  the  last  thirty 
years,  and  has  prepared  the  way  for  its  sudden 
collapse  and  supersession?  It  is  in  this  manner 
that  the  sentiment  of  Oxford  for  beauty  and  sweet- 
ness conquers,  and  in  this  manner  long  may  it  con- 
tinue to  conquer! 

In  this  manner  it  works  to  the  same  end  as  cul- 
ture, and  there  is  plenty  of  work  for  it  yet  to  do. 
I  have  said  that  the  new  and  more  democratic  force 
which  is  now  superseding  our  old  middle-class  lib- 
eralism cannot  yet  be  rightly  judged.  It  has  its 
main  tendencies  still  to  form.  We  hear  promises 
of  its  giving  us  administrative  reform,  law  reform, 
reform  of  education,  and  I  know  not  what;  but 
those  promises  come  rather  from  its  advocates, 
wishing  to  make  a  good  plea  for  it  and  to  justify 
it  for  superseding  middle-class  liberalism,  than  from 
clear  tendencies  which  it  has  itself  yet  developed. 
But  meanwhile  it  has  plenty  of  well-intentioned 
friends  against  whom  culture  may  with  advantage 
continue  to  uphold  steadily  its  ideal  of  human  per- 
fection; that  this  is  an  inward  spiritual  activity, 
having  for  its  characters  increased  sweetness,  in- 
creased light,  increased  life,  increased  sympathy. 
Mr.  Bright,  who  has  a  foot  in  both  worlds,  the 
world  of  middle-class  liberalism  and  the  world  of 


Matthew  Arnold  407 

democracy,  but  who  brings  most  of  his  ideas  from 
the  world  of  middle-class  liberalism  in  which  he 
was  bred,  always  inclines  to  inculcate  that  faith  in 
machinery  to  which,  as  we  have  seen,  Englishmen 
are  so  prone,  and  which  has  been  the  bane  of 
middle-class  liberalism.  He  complains  with  a  sor- 
rowful indignation  of  people  who  "  appear  to  have 
no  proper  estimate  of  the  value  of  the  franchise  " ; 
he  leads  his  disciples  to  believe  —  what  the  English- 
man is  always  too  ready  to  believe  —  that  the  hav- 
ing a  vote,  like  the  having  a  large  family,  or  a  large 
business,  or  large  muscles,  has  in  itself  some  edify- 
ing and  perfecting  effect  upon  human  nature.  Or 
else  he  cries  out  to  the  democracy,  — "  the  men," 
as  he  calls  them,  "  upon  whose  shoulders  the  great- 
ness of  England  rests,"  —  he  cries  out  to  them : 
"  See  what  you  have  done !  I  look  over  this  coun- 
try and  see  the  cities  you  have  built,  the  railroads 
you  have  made,  the  manufactures  you  have  pro- 
duced, the  cargoes  which  freight  the  ships  of  the 
greatest  mercantile  navy  the  world  has  ever  seen! 
I  see  that  you  have  converted  by  your  labours  what 
was  once  a  wilderness,  these  islands,  into  a  fruitful 
garden ;  I  know  that  you  have  created  this  wealth, 
and  are  a  nation  whose  name  is  a  word  of  power 
throughout  all  the  world."  Why,  this  is  just  the 
very  style  of  laudation  with  which  Mr.  Roebuck 
or  Mr.  Lowe  debauches  the  minds  of  the  middle 
classes,  and  makes  such  Philistines  of  them.  It  is 
the  same  fashion  of  teaching  a  man  to  value  him- 
self not  on  what  he  is,  not  on  his  progress  in  sweet- 
ness and  light,  but  on  the  number  of  the  railroads 
he  has  constructed,  or  the  bigness  of  the  tabernacle 
he  has  built.  Only  the  middle  classes  are  told  they 


408  Best  English  Essays 

have  done  it  all  with  their  energy,  self-reliance,  and 
capital,  and  the  democracy  are  told  they  have  done 
it  all  with  their  hands  and  sinews.  But  teaching 
the  democracy  to  put  its  trust  in  achievements  of 
this  kind  is  merely  training  them  to  be  Philistines 
to  take  the  place  of  the  Philistines  whom  they  are 
superseding;  and  they  too,  like  the  middle  class, 
will  be  encouraged  to  sit  down  at  the  banquet  of 
the  future  without  having  on  a  wedding  garment, 
and  nothing  excellent  can  then  come  from  them. 
Those  who  know  their  besetting  faults,  those  who 
have  watched  them  and  listened  to  them,  or  those 
who  will  read  the  instructive  account  recently  given 
of  them  by  one  of  themselves,  the  "  Journeyman 
Engineer,"  will  agree  that  the  idea  which  culture 
sets  before  us  of  perfection  —  an  increased  spiritual 
activity,  having  for  its  characters  increased  sweet- 
ness, increased  light,  increased  life,  increased  sym- 
pathy —  is  an  idea  which  the  new  democracy  needs 
far  more  than  the  idea  of  the  blessedness  of  the 
franchise,  or  the  wonderfulness  of  its  own  indus- 
trial performances. 

Other  well-meaning  friends  of  this  new  power 
are  for  leading  it,  not  in  the  old  ruts  of  middle-class 
Philistinism,  but  in  ways  which  are  naturally  allur- 
ing to  the  feet  of  democracy,  though  in  this  country 
they  are  novel  and  untried  ways.  I  may  call  them 
the  ways  of  Jacobinism.  Violent  indignation  with 
the  past,  abstract  systems  of  renovation  applied 
wholesale,  a  new  doctrine  drawn  up  in  black  and 
white  for  elaborating  down  to  the  very  smallest 
details  a  rational  society  for  the  future,  —  these 
are  the  ways  of  Jacobinism.  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison 
and  other  disciples  of  Comte  —  one  of  them,  Mr. 


Matthew  Arnold  409 

Congreve,  is  an  old  friend  of  mine,  and  I  am  glad 
to  have  an  opportunity  of  publicly  expressing  my 
respect  for  his  talents  and  character  —  are  among 
the  friends  of  democracy  who  are  for  leading  it  in 
paths  of  this  kind.  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  is  very 
hostile  to  culture,  and  from  a  natural  enough  mo- 
tive ;  for  culture  is  the  eternal  opponent  of  the  two 
things  which  are  the  signal  marks  of  Jacobinism, 
—  its  fierceness,  and  its  addiction  to  an  abstract 
system.  Culture  is  always  assigning  to  system- 
makers  and  systems  a  smaller  share  in  the  bent  of 
human  destiny  than  their  friends  like.  A  current 
in  people's  minds  sets  towards  new  ideas;  people 
are  dissatisfied  with  their  old  narrow  stock  of  Phil- 
istine ideas,  Anglo-Saxon  ideas,  or  any  other;  and 
some  man,  some  Bentham  or  Comte,  who  has  the 
real  merit  of  having  early  and  strongly  felt  and 
helped  the  new  current,  but  who  brings  plenty  of 
narrowness  and  mistakes  of  his  own  into  his  feel- 
ing and  help  of  it,  is  credited  with  being  the 
author  of  the  whole  current,  the  fit  person  to  be 
entrusted  with  its  regulation  and  to  guide  the  hu- 
man race. 

The  excellent  German  historian  of  the  mythology 
of  Rome,  Preller,  relating  the  introduction  at  Rome 
under  the  Tarquins  of  the  worship  of  Apollo,  the 
god  of  light,  healing,  and  reconciliation,  will  have 
us  observe  that  it  was  not  so  much  the  Tarquins 
who  brought  to  Rome  the  new  worship  of  Apollo, 
as  a  current  in  the  mind  of  the  Roman  people 
which  set  powerfully  at  that  time  towards  a  new 
worship  of  this  kind,  and  away  from  the  old  run 
of  Latin  and  Sabine  religious  ideas.  In  a  similar 
way,  culture  directs  our  attention  to  the  natural 


410  Best  English  Essays 

current  there  is  in  human  affairs,  and  to  its  con- 
tinual working,  and  will  not  let  us  rivet  our  faith 
upon  any  one  man  and  his  doings.  It  makes  us 
see  not  only  his  good  side,  but  also  how  much  in 
him  was  of  necessity  limited  and  transient;  nay, 
it  even  feels  a  pleasure,  a  sense  of  an  increased 
freedom  and  of  an  ampler  future,  in  so  doing. 

I  remember,  when  I  was  under  the  influence  of  a 
mind  to  which  I  feel  the  greatest  obligations,  the 
mind  of  a  man  who  was  the  very  incarnation  of 
sanity  and  clear  sense,  a  man  the  most  considerable, 
it  seems  to  me,  whom  America  has  yet  produced,  — 
Benjamin  Franklin,  —  I  remember  the  relief  with 
which,  after  long  feeling  the  sway  of  Franklin's 
imperturbable  common-sense,  I  came  upon  a  pro- 
ject of  his  for  a  new  version  of  the  Book  of  Job, 
to  replace  the  old  version,  the  style  of  which,  says 
Franklin,  has  become  obsolete,  and  thence  less  agree- 
able. "  I  give,"  he  continues,  "  a  few  verses,  which 
may  serve  as  a  sample  of  the  kind  of  version  I 
would  recommend."  We  all  recollect  the  famous 
verse  in  our  translation :  "  Then  Satan  answered  the 
.  Lord  and  said :  '  Doth  Job  fear  God  for  nought  ?  ' ' 
Franklin  makes  this:  "Does  your  Majesty  imagine 
that  Job's  good  conduct  is  the  effect  of  mere  per- 
sonal attachment  and  affection  ?  "  I  well  remember 
how,  when  first  I  read*that,  I  drew  a  deep  breath 
of  relief,  and  said  to  myself :  "  After  all,  there  is  a 
stretch  of  humanity  beyond  Franklin's  victorious 
good  sense !  "  So,  after  hearing  Bentham  cried 
loudly  up  as  the  renovator  of  modern  society,  and 
Bentham's  mind  and  ideas  proposed  as  the  rulers 
of  our  future,  I  open  the  "  Deontology."  There  I 
read :  "  .While  Xenophon  was  writing  his  history 


Matthew  Arnold  411 

and  Euclid  teaching  geometry,  Socrates  and  Plato 
were  talking  nonsense  under  pretence  of  talking 
wisdom  and  morality.  This  morality  of  theirs  con- 
sisted in  words;  this  wisdom  of  theirs  was  the  de- 
nial of  matters  known  to  every  man's  experience." 
From  the  moment  of  reading  that,  I  am  delivered 
from  the  bondage  of  Bentham!  the  fanaticism  of 
his  adherents  can  touch  me  no  longer.  I  feel  the 
inadequacy  of  his  mind  and  ideas  for  supplying  the 
rule  of  human  society,  for  perfection. 

Culture  tends  always  thus  to  deal  with  the  men 
of  a  system,  of  disciples,  of  a  school;  with  men 
like  Comte,  or  the  late  Mr.  Buckle,  or  Mr.  Mill. 
However  much  it  may  find  to  admire  in  these  per- 
sonages, or  in  some  of  them,  it  nevertheless  remem- 
bers the  text :  "  Be  not  ye  called  Rabbi !  "  and  it 
soon  passes  on  from  any  Rabbi.  But  Jacobinism 
loves  a  Rabbi ;  it  does  not  want  to  pass  on  from  its 
Rabbi  in  pursuit  of  a  future  and  still  unreached  per- 
fection ;  it  wants  its  Rabbi  and  his  ideas  to  stand 
for  perfection,  that  they  may  with  the  more  author- 
ity recast  the  world ;  and  for  Jacobinism,  therefore, 
culture  —  eternally  passing  onwards  and  seeking  — 
is  an  impertinence  and  an  offence.  But  culture,  just 
because  it  resists  this  tendency  of  Jacobinism  to 
impose  on  us  a  man  with  limitations  and  errors  of 
his  own  along  with  the  true  ideas  of  which  he  is 
the  organ,  really  does  the  world  and  Jacobinism 
itself  a  service. 

So,  too,  Jacobinism,  in  its  fierce  hatred  of  the 
past  and  of  those  whom  it  makes  liable  for  the 
sins  of  the  past,  cannot  away  with  the  inexhausti- 
ble indulgence  proper  to  culture,  the  consideration 
of  circumstances,  the  severe  judgment  of  actions 


412  Best  English  Essays 

joined  to  the  merciful  judgment  of  persons.  "  The 
man  of  culture  is  in  politics,"  cries  Mr.  Frederic 
Harrison,  "one  of  the  poorest  mortals  alive!"  Mr. 
Frederic  Harrison  wants  to  be  doing  business,  and 
he  complains  that  the  man  of  culture  stops  him  with 
a  "  turn  for  small  fault-finding,  love  of  selfish  ease, 
and  indecision  in  action."  Of  what  use  is  culture, 
he  asks,  except  for  "  a  critic  of  new  books  or  a  pro- 
fessor of  belles-lettres  "f  Why,  it  is  of  use  because, 
in  presence  of  the  fierce  exasperation  which  breathes, 
or  rather,  I  may  say,  hisses  through  the  whole  pro- 
duction in  which  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison  asks  that 
question,  it  reminds  us  that  the  perfection  of  hu- 
man nature  is  sweetness  and  light.  It  is  of  use 
because,  like  religion,  —  that  other  effort  after  per- 
fection, —  it  testifies  that,  where  bitter  envying 
and  strife  are,  there  is  confusion  and  every  evil 
work. 

The  pursuit  of  perfection,  then,  is  the  pursuit  of 
sweetness  and  light.  He  who  works  for  sweetness 
and  light,  works  to  make  reason  and  the  will  of 
God  prevail.  He  who  works  for  machinery,  he  who 
works  for  hatred,  works  only  for  confusion.  Cul- 
ture looks  beyond  machinery,  culture  hates  hatred; 
culture  has  one  great  passion,  the  passion  for  sweet- 
ness and  light.  It  has  one  even  yet  greater !  —  the 
passion  for  making  them  prevail.  It  is  not  satisfied 
till  we  all  come  to  a  perfect  man ;  it  knows  that  the 
sweetness  and  light  of  the  few  must  be  imperfect 
until  the  raw  and  unkindled  masses  of  humanity 
are  touched  with  sweetness  and  light.  If  I  have 
not  shrunk  from  saying  that  we  must  work  for 
sweetness  and  light,  so  neither  have  I  shrunk  from 
saying  that  we  must  have  a  broad  basis,  must  have 


Matthew  Arnold  413 

sweetness  and  light  for  as  many  as  possible.  Again 
and  again  I  have  insisted  how  those  are  the  happy 
moments  of  humanity,  how  those  are  the  marking 
epochs  of  a  people's  life,  how  those  are  the  flower- 
ing times  for  literature  and  art  and  all  the  creative 
power  of  genius,  when  there  is  a  national  glow  of 
life  and  thought,  when  the  whole  of  society  is  in 
the  fullest  measure  permeated  by  thought,  sensible 
to  beauty,  intelligent  and  alive.  Only  it  must  be  real 
thought  and  real  beauty;  real  sweetness  and  real 
light.  Plenty  of  people  will  try  to  give  the  masses, 
as  they  call  them,  an  intellectual  food  prepared  and 
adapted  in  the  way  they  think  proper  for  the  actual 
condition  of  the  masses.  The  ordinary  popular  lit- 
erature is  an  example  of  this  way  of  working  on 
the  masses.  Plenty  of  people  will  try  to  indoctri- 
nate the  masses  with  the  set  of  ideas  and  judgments 
constituting  the  creed  of  their  own  profession  or 
party.  Our  religious  and  political  organisations 
give  an  example  of  this  way  of  working  on  the 
masses.  I  condemn  neither  way ;  but  culture  works 
differently.  It  does  not  try  to  teach  down  to  the 
level  of  inferior  classes ;  it  does  not  try  to  win  them 
for  this  or  that  sect  of  its  own,  with  ready-made 
judgments  and  watchwords.  It  seeks  to  do  away 
with  classes ;  to  make  the  best  that  has  been  thought 
and  known  in  the  world  current  everywhere;  to 
make  all  men  live  in  an  atmosphere  of  sweetness 
and  light,  where  they  may  use  ideas,  as  it  uses 
them  itself,  freely,  —  nourished,  and  not  bound  by 
them. 

This  is  the  social  idea;  and  the  men  of  culture 
are  the  true  apostles  of  equality.  The  great  men  of 
culture  are  those  who  have  had  a  passion  for  diffus- 


414  Best  English  Essays 

ing,  for  making  prevail,  for  carrying  from  one  end 
of  society  to  the  other,  the  best  knowledge,  the  best 
ideas  of  their  time;  who  have  laboured  to  divest 
knowledge  of  all  that  was  harsh,  uncouth,  difficult, 
abstract,  professional,  exclusive ;  to  humanise  it, 
to  make  it  efficient  outside  the  clique  of  the  culti- 
vated and  learned,  yet  still  remaining  the  best 
knowledge  and  thought  of  the  time,  and  a  true 
source,  therefore,  of  sweetness  and  light.  Such  a 
man  was  Abelard  in  the  Middle  Ages,  in  spite  of 
all  his  imperfections  ;  and  thence  the  boundless  emo- 
tion and  enthusiasm  which  Abelard  excited.  Such 
were  Lessing  and  Herder  in  Germany,  at  the  end 
of  the  last  century;  and  their  services  to  Germany 
were  in  this  way  inestimably  precious.  Generations 
will  pass,  and  literary  monuments  will  accumulate, 
and  works  far  more  perfect  than  the  works  of  Less- 
ing  and  Herder  will  be  produced  in  Germany;  and 
yet  the  names  of  these  two  men  will  fill  a  German 
with  a  reverence  and  enthusiasm  such  as  the  names 
of  the  most  gifted  masters  will  hardly  awaken.  And 
why  ?  Because  they  humanised  knowledge ;  because 
they  broadened  the  basis  of  life  and  intelligence; 
because  they  worked  powerfully  to  diffuse  sweet- 
ness and  light,  to  make  reason  and  the  will  of  God 
prevail.  With  Saint  Augustine  they  said :  "  Let  us 
not  leave  thee  alone  to  make  in  the  secret  of  thy 
knowledge,  as  thou  didst  before  the  creation  of  the 
firmament,  the  division  of  light  from  darkness ;  let 
the  children  of  thy  spirit,  placed  in  their  firmament, 
make  their  light  shine  upon  the  earth,  mark  the  divi- 
sion of  night  and  day,  and  announce  the  revolution 
of  the  times ;  for  the  old  order  is  passed,  and  the 
new  arises;  the  night  is  spent,  the  day  is  come 


Matthew  Arnold  415 

forth;  and  thou  shalt  crown  the  year  with  thy 
blessing,  when  thou  shalt  send  forth  labourers  into 
thy  harvest  sown  by  other  hands  than  theirs ;  when 
thou  shalt  send  forth  new  labourers  to  new  seed- 
times, whereof  the  harvest  shall  be  not  yet." 


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